Super Six: The Edge
by LovelyFandomLife
Summary: Our world is gone. Everyone is dead. The cities are empty. Anything you might have known is now a memory. In the scattered wastes of what used to be the US, we find six teen survivors, doing all they can to stay away from the edge. The edge of hunger. The edge of disease. The edge of humanity. {Rise of the Brave Tangled Frozen Dragons, RotBTFD, RotBTD; ZombieApocalypse!AU}
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

_NBC News: _

_Recent studies have shown this new outbreak to be dangerous. If not handled properly, it might even cause death, especially for those with ill heath. Here we have a Dr. Stevens with advise on how to keep yourself healthy._

* * *

Medical Report: The knewly discovered disease known as Homo Spongiform Encephalopathy is DEADLY. Once contaminated, the chances of survival of the patient are zero.

* * *

_**Washington Post**_

Recent reports are claiming that the new HSE disease is a strain of the Bovine Spongiform Ecephalopathy, otherwise known as Mad Cow Disease. As far as it can be established, the disease is contagious at any stage of its gestation period. We suggest washing your hands and wiping down anything that might have had contact with beef. Avoid eating anything that might have come from a cow. Experts say it is impossible to figure out if this disease has come from the current livestock, or if it is something else entirely, but they suggest avoiding any beef products, just to be safe.

* * *

Medical Report: The HSE virus is HIGHLY CONTAGIOUS. The virus is primarily an airborn contagion and can travel quickly in a small amount of time. Results show that a patient can infect up to 25 or even 50 other specimens in the space of a week. It is estimated that less than a third of the population is immune to the airborn strain.

* * *

_ Fox News: _

_We've received reports saying HSE is contagious. Infection is wide spread and growing. We are urging people to stay inside and to not come into contact with anyone that is known to be infected._

* * *

Public Announcement: All schools are to be CLOSED in order to keep contact with others, and chances of infection by the HSE virus, to an absolute minimum. It is indefinite as to when they will be reopened.

* * *

_BBC News: _

_We have reports concerning victims of the HSE virus who were originally reported as dead. People are are claiming that the victims are coming back to life. Doctors have identified the reason behind this unexpected event to be a coma-like state brought on by the virus that closely mimics death. Most people are mistaking this coma stage of the virus for death. Not all are known to survive this coma; some are known to succumb to fever or the infection. But if they do survive, you can look forward to seeing your loved ones up and walking again. Most are calling it a miracle._

* * *

Medical Report: After close observation, we have found that patients who have survived the coma state of the HSE virus not only seem to have very little brain function left, but additionally, they often tend to become violent, frequently attacking and attempting to bite other people.

* * *

_**The Guardian**_

We've received reliable reports that though a percentage of the population is known to be immune to the airborn virus known as HSE, if someone were to be bitten—yes, that's right, _bitten_—by someone infected with the HSE virus, then they _will_ become infected. There is no immunity from a direct bite from someone that has been infected.

* * *

Medical Report: Infected patients are becoming increasingly violent. A nurse has been KILLED by an infected patient.

* * *

_CNN News: _

_Avoid any contact with anyone infected with the HSE virus, otherwise known as the "zombie virus" at all costs. There are reports claiming that those who have been infected are becoming violent, with attempts to bite and scratch others. We received information saying that some have even killed others. The virus is spreading with no hope for an effective cure. What is important is that widespread panic is kept at bay in such a time as this.  
_

_.  
_

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_._

_NBC News: _

_~Chizzz~ The virus known as the HSE virus has overrun most of the country ~Shhhhftch~ few left ~Chchch~ refugee camps in Florida, Vermont, Rhode Island ~Shhhhitsssshhh~ some on the west coast have ~Shzzzz~ make camps ~Shhftttch~ last broadcast ~Chizzitzz_


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1: Hiccup**

It was hot. No like your typical, Michigan summer hot, either. Oh, no. It was _hot. _Like surface of the sun hot. Like falling in the campfire by accident hot. Like house turned inferno hot.

Hiccup coughed and hacked, his lungs trying desperately to empty themselves of the smoke that had been invading his lungs for the past ten minutes. _Shit, shit, shit._ What'd they always said in elementary school? Stop, drop, and roll, right? Well shit ton of good that did him now. He wasn't the one on fire, the house was. And he couldn't very well stop, drop, or roll a house. As he stumbled through his own home set ablaze, his mind raced, jumping from one thing to another, trying to sort through all the facts and information in his head to find what was important: What the hell were you supposed to do in a fire?

All he could come up with was that you were supposed to crawl below the ceiling of smoke that would build up right around waist height. But he couldn't _do_ that. That would slow him down and he had to grab his supplies, find Toothless, and _get out_. He didn't have time to army crawl everywhere.

Hiccup staggered into his room, the stinging in his eyes from the smoke and flames making him tear up. The water in his eyes did nothing except blur his vision, making it twice as hard to see anything through the smoke and ash. Hiccup stumbled around his room until he managed to find his bed. He grabbed his backpack that he'd left there and did his best to feel his way around until he found his duffle bag a few feet away on the floor. Thank Odin's beard he'd already packed.

Hiccup hauled his luggage out of his room and into the hall. He staggered and slid down with his shoulder against the wall, hacking and sputtering all the way tot he ground. His throat was raw, his lungs were burning. He knew that in a fire, it wasn't the flames that you had to worry about, it was the smoke. If he didn't hurry up, he'd suffocate before he even made it to the door.

Fire was everywhere and the heat was building, the temperature only proving to strangle Hiccup in addition to all the smoke and ash. It felt like it he was the one on fire, not the house, his hair and clothes already soaked through with sweat. He could feel the skin of his left leg start to burn as the metal of his prosthetic leg continued to heat up. Gods, it felt like he was roasting alive. That stupid hellfire song from a movie he used to watch as a child kept playing in his head.

There was a high-pitched screech from overhead and a crash as a cross beam fell and landed a good eight feet off to his right, sending up a shower of flames and sparks. _Damn it, Dad._ He'd tried to tell him. Hiccup knew building a house, "the good old fashioned way," completely out of wood, had been a bad idea. Hiccup suddenly heard barking off to his left.

"Toothless!" Hiccup shouted, struggling to see were the sound was coming from through dense veil of smoke and fire. He heard the barking again, louder this time. Hiccup managed to get back on his feet, the smoke still attacking him from all sides as the temperature continued to climb.

"Toothless!" he yelled before lapsing into another fit of coughing. He could hear the barking clearly now as a black form came bounding through the smoke screen. He pounced on Hiccup, nearly toppling him over again.

"There you are, Bud," Hiccup said, the sight of his best friend providing the only relief in this seventh level of hell of fire and wood. Toothless continued to bark and licked at his master's face, tail wagging ecstatically at having found him alive.

"Good boy, good boy," Hiccup managed to talk the dog down. "Come on, let's get out of here."

Hiccup trudged to the top of the stairs, backpack, duffle, and now dog, all in tow as the fire continued to roar around them.

"Oh, no," Hiccup muttered as he looked down at the foot of the stairs. It was engulfed in a wall of flames that reached half-way up the stair case. There was no way they'd get through that safely. Hiccup began to panic. If they didn't find a way our of here soon, he and Toothless were both going to trapped in this cage of flame and death.

"Come on, Bud," Hiccup commanded as he turned away from the stairs. He started making his way back towards his room. Two steps in, he fell, collapsing in another fit of coughing. Toothless licked at his face, a concerned whine coming from his throat. _Shit_, Hiccup thought. He could barely breath. They had to hurry, or else he wasn't going to make it.

Hiccup pushed Toothless off and they managed to make it back to Hiccup's room. As soon as they passed through the doorway, there was a loud screech, and another ceiling beam came down, right outside the door, blocking them in. Embers and ashes scattered everywhere. Hiccup's room was completely aflame. Toothless was barking. Everything was chaos. Hiccup looked at the doorway, now nothing but a wall of flame. _This better work_, he thought. If it didn't, then it looked like they were going down with the house.

Hiccup dropped his bags next to one of his bedroom windows, the constant coughing making everything that had to do with physical exertion all the more difficult. He ripped open the duffle and rummaged around until he found a baseball bat. Without hesitation, he swung it at the window, letting out a _crack! _as a spiderweb spread across the glass. Hiccup wasn't one known for his strength, so it took him a couple of tries before he managed to finally break the window, the explosion of shattered glass creating a glittering shower that rained down below. Hiccup gasped at the clean air, his lungs thankful for the relief. The relief didn't last long as smoke rushed past him to open air, swallowing his head.

Hacking and coughing once more, Hiccup reached down and hauled both bags out the window. He swung a leg over the windowsill and glanced at the two-story drop below. It wasn't a long fall, he knew, but he still couldn't help the feeling of vertigo that washed over him. As he pulled his other leg over, Hiccup heard another crash and felt the house moan as its structure weakened. _Damn it. _They were running out of time. He held his breath and shut his eyes as he pushed himself off the edge.

Hiccup let out a yelp as his right leg twisted under him when he hit the ground. Great, now he was down to two bum legs. He rolled onto his side, coughing and hacking. He threw up, lungs on fire as the poison from the smoke still festered in his lungs. After his fit, Hiccup managed stand up, testing his right leg to see if he could still walk. A pain shot up his side, but it wasn't anything he couldn't handle. He found both of his bags and dragged them away from the burning house.

At the sound of barking, Hiccup turned around to find that his canine companion wasn't behind him. He could've sworn he felt the Earth fall out beneath him. Toothless hadn't followed him out the window. Hiccup stumbled as he ran back to the house, searching the windows as the sound of barking still echoed from upstairs. He soon found the right window, a black form at the ledge as the barking became more frantic and scared.

"Toothless," Hiccup screamed with all that was left of his sore lungs. The barking grew louder. "Toothless, come here boy! You have to jump!"

The barking continued. Hiccup could see his dog paw at the window ledge, the barks interrupted by nervous whining. _Shit._This wasn't good. Toothless was too scared to jump. Hiccup's heart was racing, his mind had gone numb. He'd already lost his dad, he couldn't loose his best friend, too. A helplessness worked its way into his chest.

"Come on, you useless canine!" Hiccup called, the tears in his throat not making it any easier to shout. "Jump!"

There was one last bark and then Toothless jumped. "Yeah, baby!" Hiccup shouted, his face lighting up with relief. The jump was perfect. Toothless flew through the air almost as if he were built for it. He came down to land in Hiccup's arms, his momentum bringing them both to the ground. In a small moment of panic, Hiccup managed to pat down some black fur that had caught fire. The flame went out in seconds, leaving Hiccup room to laugh, the relief of his friend safe and in his arms overwhelming as the black lab covered his face with sloppy dog kisses, tail wagging.

Unfortunately, their reunion had to be broken short. They were only a few feet from a raging inferno, after all. Hiccup managed to wriggle out from under his friend to stand up. The two of them made it to the other side of the lawn, where Hiccup had left the bags.

The yard was a large one. Standing at the edge, Toothless and Hiccup were more than thirty feet away from the flaming house. They were in the non-so-suburban part of Michigan, somewhere far enough away from most crowds. The space gave room for a larger distance between neighbors than was normal, as well as extra acres of land that allowed for large yards and log houses.

When the two reached the bags, Hiccup collapsed. He was exhausted. His right leg ached as what was left of his left leg stung, his prosthetic still hot to the touch. His lungs were burning, he was covered in soot, and he had blisters running up and down his arms. He let himself fall on his but, back up against his bags as he looked at the remains of his home. The fire was still raging. The roof was sagging from loss of infrastructure and the first story windows had blown out from the building pressure of the heat. Though they were some distance from the house, they could still feel the heat of the fire, roaring as it continued to tear through wood and memories.

Hiccup sat and panted, trying to control his breathing and heart-rate, as he watched as his childhood home burned. He remembered when his dad had first decided to build it, over ten years ago, not long after his mother had left.

"It'll be a thing o' beauty," he'd said, contemplating a plot of land amidst a newly growing neighborhood. A tiny Hiccup was right at his side as they stood at the edge of the empty lot.

"Because it'll be something we made it together," his father had said. He suddenly reached down, catching an unsuspecting Hiccup by surprise. Hiccup squealed with laughter as he was lifted high and swung atop his father's shoulders.

"It'll be our new home, huh, Dad?" he'd asked.

"Got that right. For the two of us, just you and me."

"The two of us forever," Hiccup agreed as he hugged his father's head and that deep, rumbling laugh his dad had always had came from below. Just the two of them. Forever. Turned out forever was a lot shorter than either of them had thought.

Hiccup heard a whine to his right. He looked over to find Toothless nosing his way under Hiccup's arm to rest his head in his lap. Large green eyes looked up at their master. Hiccup gave a small smile as he felt a stinging in his eyes that had nothing to do with the smoke.

"I know, Bud, I miss him, too," he said as he ruffled the lab's furry head.

Hiccup had never gotten along with his father as well as he would've liked. They both had their differences that had them clashing heads most times, but still. They were a family. A small one, granted, but still family. Hiccup felt tears run down his face as he turned back to watch the house his father had poured his heart and soul into burn.

"I know we couldn't save him," Hiccup told Toothless, unable to stop his voice form cracking. "He was already sick, but I just—"

Hiccup's words were cut off with a sob. Toothless wriggled further under Hiccup's arm as he reached up to lick his master's face. Hiccup gave a week laugh at the attempts of his friend and pulled Toothless close to burry his face in the familiar fur. The two stayed like that for a while, tears soaking into black fur as dog whines filled the silence between the two. The fire had consumed most of the house by the time they stood up again.

Hiccup wiped a his face dry and did his best to stash away his feelings. They'd spent enough time out in the open was it was. They had to get moving before anyone that was infected saw them. Hiccup picked up his two bags and gave a whistle, telling Toothless to follow.

The two started on their way down the street, the air eerily empty of any sound, safe for the roaring house-fed bon-fire down that continued to burn down the street. There were no sounds, no sirens or firetrucks or ambulances to be heard. It wasn't as if they were expected. The police and fire stations had shut down not long after the news stations. Hiccup hadn't heard a siren of any sort in over three months. Not even an ambulance. Those had been the first to stop, believe it or not. The hospitals had been overrun with hoards of the infected, people grasping at those last strands of hope that they could be cured or healed. That'd been before anyone had known what the virus really was. Not just some cold or H1N1. Oh, no. They soon found that it was something much bigger than that. It was only in the last few weeks. The last few weeks of a functioning world, with its failing governments and silent ambulances. The last few weeks of humanity. It was then they finally figured out what the virus really was. But by that point, they'd already run out of time.

Hiccup reached around into his backpack as they walked. He brought his hand back holding a small picture of a woman with brown hair that was greying and hazel eyes that were just like Hiccup's. Hiccup didn't know the woman of the picture too well, but the face was all too familiar. He flipped the picture over to look at the back and found a scrawled handwriting.

_Washington, D.C. Come find me when you're ready._

_Be brave, my little viking._

It was seven-hundred and nine miles from Michigan to D.C., close to a twelve hour drive. There was no saying how long it'd take on foot.

Hiccup let out a sigh, folded the picture in half, and tucked it away in his pants' pocket. He looked down at Toothless, trotting happily beside him.

"How ya feeling, Bud? Up for a bit of a walk?"

A cheerful bark came way of response. Despite everything, Hiccup couldn't help but smile.

"Good, 'cause we've got one hell of a trip ahead of us."

And with that, the two continued down the street, boy and dog, side by side. Just the two of them.

* * *

**A/N: hey, surprise, surprise, it's a new story...instead of an update on anything that already have up... -.- Anyways, felt like writing, but not about anything I already had going, so I made a new story! ^.^ tehe I've seen a lot of zombie!AU fanart of these guys before, but not too many fics, so I decided to make a contribution. And, you know, the whole zombie thing is kinda cool. First fic with Frozen characters, so feel free to bash it and anyone that's ooc. Not based on any other franchise (INCLUDING the walking dead). Also, ran into a little creative block while planning. I'm not entirely sure if there'll be any ships in this fic. And if there is, I'm just at a loss as to who to ship, especially since I'm planning to include EVERYONE in the story. Usually, I can pick a ship and just roll with it, but ever since the Jelsa ship, it's been messin' with my HiJack OTP and I've always been a fan of Hicstrid and Mericup, so now my feels are all a mess and I don't even know who I want to end up together anymore. So, it's all lead me to this: open voting. If you have an idea of who you want to end up together, make a comment about it. Or if you don't want any ship sailing on these zombie waters, comment that, too. It's whatever, vote what you want and I'll do my best to include the top voted. But yeah, sorry for the long author's note and happy voting!**


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two: Anna**

She took a breath a knocked.

_Knock. Knock. Knock-knock. Knock._

Five knocks. The simple rhythm that she'd claimed since childhood. She used to use it with her sister all the time. A secret knock for forts and clubs. A secret knock to let each other in their rooms late at night when they wanted to sneak around the house after bed time. A secret knock they'd even used when one of them came home late after curfew and needed to be let in. It was their knock. A short, cheery rhythm that was so familiar and so _theirs. _

It sounded flat now. Just like the rest of the world, with no more life or bustling cities or complete families. It was all dead, the sounds and images falling flat, just like that knock.

"Elsa?" she asked, cautious as she pressed her cheek against the wood of the door. "I know you're in there. I know you can hear me."

She paused, waiting for an answer. Waiting for anything. Any sound or movement that would tell her that her sister was still on the other side of that door. That she didn't just evaporate to leave her alone in this flat world with its dead cities and its dead parents. Silence. Maybe she was alone after all.

"Elsa, please," she started, voice cracking under the weight of the silence coming from the other side of the door. "Just let me in."

"You know I can't do that." Anna froze, relief pounding in her heart at the sound of her sister on the other side of that door. She wasn't alone. Not yet.

"Elsa, please just open the door."

"I can't."

"Yes, you can," Anna pleaded. "It's just some stupid virus—"

"Anna, please. I don't want to hurt you."

"You won't."

Silence. Again. She leaned forward, letting her shoulder rest against the unyielding door. Anna felt the pin-pricks of tears behind her eyes. She couldn't do this. She couldn't handle being alone. She swallowed, trying to keep the sound of tears out of her voice.

"Elsa. It just you and me now. We only have each other. If you shut me out, we won't have anything left."

"I can't," came the response from the other side of the door. "I might get you sick."

Anna turned to let her back rest against the door, letting the weight of everything pull her down to the floor. She could feel her eyes begin to water.

"So what?"

All she got was silence. What a surprise. Anna looked to the ceiling and let out a mirthless laugh at the irony of it all. After all this time. After surviving and not getting sick. After her parents had died, after Elsa had gotten sick. After everything, she was still alive. And after everything, she was going to loose it all, anyways.

"So what if I get sick? So what if I catch the virus? There's nothing left for me."

"Anna, I told Mom and Dad I'd protect you—"

"Mom and Dad are dead, Elsa!" Anna yelled. She didn't know where it had come from. She could feel how stunned her sister was on the other side of the door. She had to take a shaking breath to calm down. It wasn't that she was angry. She was just scared. So, so scared. And so, so alone. Tears burned as they finally overflowed and ran down her face. She continued in a voice barely above a whisper.

"I should know, I was the one that buried them. And I had to do it _alone_. Without you. Y-You can't just keep shutting everyone out!"

She waited for an answer. All she got was silence. And this time, it was too heavy. Anna broke down. She let her body sag against the door as tears scorched her face. Her chest shuttered with small sobs she couldn't stop. She was loosing it. She was breaking down and she didn't know how to stop it. The other side of the door was still silent. Minutes ticked by as Anna cried quietly outside her sister's door. Tick-tock. Tick-tock. She couldn't tell how many had passed by the time the tears slowed and she could talk again.

"Elsa, please," she whispered, tears still running down her face. "I know you're sick. I know I'm going to loose you, too. But, please. I can't do this alone. Just…let me in."

There was a pause. She wondered if Elsa would answer at all. But then,

"I…I can't, Anna."

Anna closed her eyes and rested her head against the door. She couldn't keep fighting anymore. She didn't have the strength. This was it. Her sister had won. Anna just felt so empty. As if there was nothing left. Nothing left of her. Nothing left of her family. Nothing left of the world. Everything was gone.

"Elsa, what are we gonna do?" she asked, her question heavy as it weighed down on them.

Silence was her only answer.


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three: Jack**

The world had stopped. Real time had frozen. Like the way the air seems to freeze during the winter, so it bites at your face and nips at your nose. Like the way a pond freezes over in December, leaving nothing but a thin layer of ice to separate you and the hypothermia that waits beneath its mirrored surface. The air had frozen, the world had stopped spinning, time had ceased to exist, leaving nothing but him and that pair of big, brown eyes looking back at him.

"It's ok," he said, reaching out toward the last bit of this world that wasn't frozen. The last bit of this world that mattered. "It's ok."

His little sister looked up at him with wide, brown eyes. She was scared. She was terrified. He couldn't blame her, so was he. He glanced down at the fifty foot drop below, the only thing to break a fall being the steal crossbeams and metal cords that crisscrossed across the multiple levels of the construction site. He looked back at Emma.

"Don't look down. Just…look at me."

"Jack, I'm scared."

His heart broke. He'd never heard her this scared before. In that moment, nothing matter. Not this still, immobile world, not the drop, not his own life. In that moment, there was one thing he was sure of. He had to get her out of here. He had to make sure she was safe.

"I know, I know," he said, trying to keep his own fear out of his voice. "But, you're gonna be alright. Ah—"

A sudden gust of wind swept by, huge and powerful. It whipped around them both, pulling at their hair, clawing at their clothes, trying to rip them away from their perches and send them tumbling below. The steal structure of what would've been a building moaned and creaked against the wind, its past few months of maintenance forgotten in the epidemic of the HSE virus.

It'd seemed like a good idea at the time. Climbing the abandoned construction site and using it for shelter against the sickies. That's what they'd been calling them, the infected. "Sickies." Emma's word choice, of course, but Jack was the one that had decided to roll with it.

Ever since leaving their foster house, almost a month ago, the two had kept to the main roads for the most part. The open space had a more secure feeling as opposed to the backroads covered by foliage that gave too much cover for looters or sickies to sneak up or hide behind. Following the big roads, lead them into big cities. Not too big of cities, because they knew by that point that the main cities were dangerous. But relatively small cities, like the one they'd come into last night, sometime after crossing the Maine border into Vermont. They'd scavenged for supplies from the blown out and abandoned shops and homes before deciding to settle down for the night.

Neither of them had ever been taught to drive, and Jack was terrified to try to learn and risk getting into an accident with his sister as riding shotgun. So that only left their only open option to walk out of the Northern part of the country before winter hit in a few months. By the time they made it into the city, both were exhausted. At their wits end while running on empty fuel tanks. Neither had the strength to stay up and watch guard while the other slept.

It was then that the two came across the abandoned construction site. It was a plot of land that was all dirt and steel. A framework of metal support and cross beams made a life-sized Jenga game that reached towards the sky. It was unfinished. A skeleton of a structure, devoid of any walls or flooring that would've made it whole.

It was Jack that had the ingenious idea to camp out on one of the unfinished upper levels. As far as either of them knew, sickies couldn't climb. Either their muscles were too degenerated, or their minds too far gone to figure out the mechanics. And even if they could, there was no way they'd be able to reach fifty feet.

Working quickly, Jack had managed to start up one of the cranes still left on site. With a good deal of tinkering, he was able to line up the end of the crane with a crossbeam on one of the unfinished floors close to the top of the structure. After turning the crane off, the two scampered up the arm to the floor-less level of the skeletal structure. They settled down, making sure to tie themselves to support beams with scavenged nylon rope so they wouldn't fall off in their sleep.

No worry of any sickies taking them by surprise. No lookouts necessary. Both could get a good night's rest. So, it really had been a great idea. At the time.

Right now, though, looking back, it had been a terrible idea. The worst idea yet.

The two had woken to a cacophony of rattling and clanging. They woke, fuzzy minded and slightly confused. It took Jack all of three seconds to remember where they were and why they were there. It took him all of twelve to look down and comprehend what he was seeing. It was the infected.

Turns out the sickies weren't as helpless as originally thought. They were climbing. Spider-manning their way up the same crane Jack and Emma had shimmied their way up last night. The sickies' random and jerking movements were causing the crane arm to jump and move about, knocking it into the metal of the steel structure to make the clanking noises that had woken Jack and Emma up. Jack figured they must've been at it for a while, considering how close they were to the tip of the crane.

Jack had cut through the ropes holding him and his sister to the structure and had them running along their beam in the opposite direction of the sickies in under a minute. That crane had been their only way down, and now it was crawling with sickies. They needed to find another way out, all while still avoiding the infected that had now made it to the top of the crane and were now shambling their way across the support beams of the would-be building.

Jack had been charging along the beams and cross bearings, pulling his sister along by the hand, when there was a sudden shriek of tearing metal. He felt the flooring beneath his feet tilt upwards as he let go of his sister's hand, not wanting to drag her down if he was going to fall.

The beam they'd been running along had broken right under Jack's feet, the welding on it having not been finished thanks to the building's abandonment during the the mass panic of the epidemic. Metal screamed and tore and Jack fell forward, hands scrambling for purchase as his feet slipped on air. He managed to wrap his arms and legs around the beam as it swung downwards, the world around him spinning as he thought for sure he was going to fall. And then, it stopped. The screeching stopped and the world stopped tilting. One end of the beam was still connected to another crossbeam in front of him, leaving him dangling on one end of a giant, up-side-down letter L. Jack's heart was pounding, face pressed against cold metal as his breathing raced. He'd thought he was going to die. He'd thought that that was it.

"Jack!"

He looked up to find his sister at the edge of the broken beam behind him. Only she wasn't looking at him. She was looking behind her. The sickies were catching up. One or two were dangerously close to the end of the beam Emma was still standing on. The panic he'd felt when he was falling came back in full force. He couldn't let them get to her.

He glanced up. The cross beam that his was still attached to was intact and horizontal. He managed to shimmy his way up his dangling piece of steel beam and climb upright onto the unbroken one. He looked back to find his sister on the other side of the gap, the distance between them too far to reach across.

And that was how they'd ended up here. Two orphans, stranded on either edge of a broken beam with nothing but six feet of open air between them.

"Emma, look at me," he said. "You're not gonna fall. We—"

He glanced down, his mind racing. He needed a way to calm her down. She was panicking. Sickies continued to march their way across the steel structure of the building towards her.

"We're gonna have a little fun, instead," he said.

"No, we're not!" she screamed, tears threatening.

Emma's feet shuffled, taking tiny steps back from the jagged edge of the beam as she looked back over her shoulder. She was moving further away from him. A sickie had managed to climb onto the end of her beam.

"Would I trick you?" He cracked a grin, gritting his teeth together to keep them from chattering. He couldn't let her see how scared he was.

"Yes! You always play tricks!"

Jack couldn't help but laugh. She had him, there.

"Alright. Well, not-not this time," he said his voice low, doing his best to keep her calm while his own heart raced. Another sickie joined the first. "I promise, I _promise_. You're gonna be fine. You have to believe in me. You wanna play a game?" he asked.

She looked back at him. Good. That had got her attention.

"We'll play hop-scotch," he continued. "Like we used to everyday back home."

He saw her lips twitch upwards, her fear suspended momentarily. She gave a tiny nod. Relief flooded him. He had a way of getting her to move.

"Ok, just on the count of three, you have to jump," he coaxed. She nodded.

The beam she was standing on had begun to tremble as more sickies piled on the other end.

"One."

He glanced behind her. One or two sickies had fallen off the beam, but it wasn't enough. A hoard was making its way towards them. He could hear growling and shuffling as they moved further along the beam.

"Two."

They were getting closer and closer. They were almost on top of her. He toed the edge of his own beam, hands stretched out, ready to catch her.

"Three!"

She jumped. A sickie lunged and swiped at her ankle. There was a scream and Jack was grabbing at empty air. The swipe had thrown Emma off balance. She only made it half way to him.

The last bit of this world that wasn't frozen. The last bit of this world that mattered. And it fell to shatter into a million pieces on the pavement below.


	5. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four: Merida**

She crept forward, eyes peeled, ears straining to pick up any sound. Her body was as tense as her bow string, pulled back, ready to be unleashed on its next unsuspecting victim. Merida stepped with light feet over the floor of green and growth of the forest, eyes trained on her target. She hadn't been noticed yet, and she planned to keep it that way. Her heart was racing and her own breathing sounded unbelievably loud in her own ears. She had to get this right. There were no second chances. It was this shot, or it was the end.

An orange curl fell in her face. She blew it out of the way with a huff as quietly as she can manage. She felt the mass weight of her hair grow heavier as the sweat and humidity weigh it down. Normally, she would've wrangled her mass of unruly curls into a pony-tail. Especially for hunting, just to keep it out of the way. But she'd run out of her stock of hair products that she usually used to tame the mane a month or so ago. That, mixed with the dreadful humidity had turned doing anything with her hair a hopeless endeavor. Looked like she'd just have to deal with it.

It was quiet. Mind numbingly quiet. The only quiet you get after the world has ended. There was no distant sound of cars on some back country highway. No whirs of air-conditioning units or water systems from apartment buildings and overrun neighborhoods. No buzz from the land lines strung across wooden pillars along the side of the road. All of that had stopped and died out months ago. Now there was nothing. All those sounds were gone, leaving only the quiet noises of the forest. The chirping crickets. The small twitter of a bird. The rustle as wind combs its way through the tree tops. There was only the quiet the threatened to betray Merida's presence to her prey. The unrelenting quiet that was so complete it—

"Merida!"

_Bloody hell. _In the blink of an eye, the squirrel that she had been honing in on for the last minute and a half had shot across the maze of tree branches and was out of sight. Merida released the tension on her bow, letting her arms fall.

"Mum!" she hollered in annoyance. "Ya spoiled my shot!"

"Merida." There was a rustling as Merida's mother came crashing through the underbrush, creating a cacophony that grated on Merida's ears, compared to the absolute silence of before. "You shouldn't be out here on your own. It's not safe," her mother said as she finally came into view, emerging from the brush like some woodland queen. All elegance and head held high. She'd always been like that. Too much pompous grace for her own good.

Merida rolled her eyes.

"It's not any more, with you makin' so much noise."

Her mother came to meet Merida, amongst the greenery, face to face. The look she gave her daughter was far from amused.

"Merida, I'm serious."

"So am I," Merida said, her irritation only exaggerating her already prominent Scottish accent. "Look at the racket yer makin'! You'll draw every bloody sicko here with yer yellin' an' greetin'."

Elinor raised and eyebrow.

"'Sickos'? Is that what you're calling them now?"

Merida swung her compound bow over her shoulder as she sheathed her arrow and turned away from her mother. She started marching deeper into the woods.

"I'll call them wha' I want," she said, back turned. "Now leave me bee. I'm lookin' for dinner."

"Dinner's on the table."

Merida stopped in her tracks. Silence fell on the two of them. Not the peaceful silence of before. But a strained silence. Elinor knew what her daughter was going to say. Merida knew she knew.

"From the pantry?" Merida asked.

"Where else would it come from?"

Merida let out a hissed breath through clenched teeth. Her fist shot out to hit a nearby tree, the bark bloodying her knuckles. She spun around, a mass of orange curls flung around to follow, and marched towards the direction of the house.

"Merida," her mother started as she reached for her daughter. "I just don't want you out here where you could get hurt—"

She smacked her mother's hand away without a word and kept marching, leaving her mother alone in the empty silence of the forest.

* * *

"Merida, no weapons on the table!"

"I'll put mai bow wherever I damned well please!"

"Fergus, control your daughter!"

"Boys! That does not come inside the house! PUT IT BACK!"

The DunBroch house was chaos, as always. Everyone was yelling. Elinor was trying to control a daughter as unruly as her hair. Meanwhile, Fergus was attempting to keep the three DunBroch toddlers in check, a task as easy as training chipmunks for the circus. It was almost as if nothing had changed. As if there was no epidemic. No HSE virus, no sickos. As if the world hadn't ended to leave them standing on their own.

They were separated from it all, on their own little secluded plot of land in the woods, removed from the world and its hoards of sickos. They acted just as they had before the virus hit. Family dinners. Stories in front of the fire place. Washing laundry, cleaning rooms. Eating from the pantry as if it wasn't a week short of running dry.

Everyone eventually managed to settle down to the table for a meal, Fergus adjusting his large form at the head with the three wee devils fidgeting on the other side of a brooding Merida, her bow and quiver swung over the back of her chair, and Elinor at the other end.

"Boys, eat your veggies, don't play with them," Elinor chided the triplets, who'd begun a war between themselves, launching peas at each other with their spoons.

Merida aimlessly stabbed at the roast beef on her plate, ignoring the ruckus across the table from her.

"You too, lassie," her dah'd said as he leaned towards her, so her mother wouldn't hear. "Better not let that go to waste." He'd spoken in a low voice, trying to be encouraging in a way only a father can be.

She glanced up at him, then looked back down at her plate without a word. She continued to abuse the meat with her fork.

He was about to say something more, when Elinor spoke up.

"Fergus, _your_ daughter was out, roaming the woods again this evening."

He looked at Merida, then back to her mother, confusion spread thick across his face.

"So what? She's grown, she can go where she likes."

"Fergus," Elinor said, a pointed look on her face. "It's dangerous out there. What with all those sick people roaming around."

"Mum," Merida interjected. She didn't like being talked about as if she weren't there. "There isn't a sicko in a two mile radius of the house. I—"

"It doesn't matter." Elinor shook her head. "All you need is one straggler, and we've lost you for good."

"I can take care of myself!" Merida burst. She was sick and tired of being treated like a child. "Besides, we need some other way of findin' food."

"And what's wrong with the food that's in front of you?" her mother demanded.

"It's from the pantry. We keep eatin' from the pantry, we won' have anything left in a couple of weeks! It's not like we live on a farm. The only other way for us to get food is teh hunt if we don't want teh starve." She didn't get why her parents were being so thick. It was only logic.

"Merida, you can't go out there alone. I forbid it! It's too dangerous, you'll get hurt—"

"Then let Dah'd go with me! Then I won't be alone."

"Merida, you know your dad's leg has been acting up. If he suddenly can't walk, then you would not be able to get him back home. You're not strong enough to carry him."

It was true. Fergus DunBroch was a large man. Close to four hundred pounds of nothing but height and muscle. Much to big for Merida to heft on her own. He'd lost his left leg a few years ago during a hunting accident. It was a story he'd loved telling Merida and her brothers, dramatizing it, changing little things every time he told it to make it all the more exciting. But recently, the nerve endings in his stump had been acting up, at times causing him enough pain that he couldn't wear his prosthetic. The flair ups were few and far between, but the chance of one happening while he was away from the house would mean a certain death. And likely not a quick one.

"Mum!" Merida was reaching her wits end at this point. Her mother just wouldn't listen. "Yeh've got teh give me my freedom! I can't stay cooped up here for much longer, I'll go mad. Just let me into the woods. Let me hunt!"

"Merida, the woods are _dangerous__._"

"Just let me go for a few hours tomorrow and I'll show you that it's not that bad."

"I can't do that."

"Of course you can, it's not like—"

"No, Merida, I really can't."

"I don't see what the big deal is. Just one chance. Tomorrow, just let me—"

"I said no."

"Why? Why not? I just don't—"

"Because we won't be here tomorrow!"

Silence fell like a hammer. Everything stopped. Merida went numb. She couldn't comprehend what she'd just heard. Fergus stared at his wife, stunned that she'd lost her temper so quickly. Even the triplets had stopped their pea war to look at their mother. At four years old, they couldn't understand much of the world, but they understood what their mother had meant.

After a moment, Elinor closed her eyes. She took a deep breath. Her shoulders slumped the slightest bit when she exhaled.

"We only have a few days worth of food left," she announced into the silence. "We can't stay here any longer. We're leaving in the morning."

_"WHAT?!"_ Merida shot to her feet, dumbfounded. Her mother continued in a steady voice.

"Your father and I were going to tell you after dinner, but it looks like you've given me no choice."

"Mum, that's mad," Merida insisted. She started throwing her arms around, her energy close to bursting at the seams. "Just let me go out and make a run to town. I can pick up food there and be back before nightfall."

"No," Elinor said, her tone dangerous. "I am not having you go out there on your own. You may never come back."

"It's a lot better than all of us leaving!"

"Merida, your father and I have already discussed this. It is final."

"Don't you get it? We can't leave! We're safe here. If we go out there—"

"Merida."

She pulled up short, surprised by the interruption. Merida cautiously turned towards her father.

"Dah'd?"

He didn't look at her, just stared at his plate. His expression was unreadable, but he was gripping the side of the table hard enough that Merida could see that his knuckles had gone white.

"The town store would be picked over clean by now," he explained cooly. "You'd have to go to the next town over if you wanted to make a run and that's too far of a trip for you to be on your own. Listen to your mother. We have no choice. This is our only option left."

Merida looked helplessly at her father, who refused to look at her. She cast a glance at her mother, her stony expression as immovable as ever. She couldn't believe this. They were leaving the house. Their home. Their safe haven ever since all this madness started. And all for what? Because her mother thought she couldn't handle herself out there. Because her parents couldn't handle the thought of their family separating, even for a day.

If only they'd just _listen_, then maybe they'd understand. They'd understand that Merida really could take care of herself. That they could let her go and not have to worry about her coming back because she knew she always would. They'd understand how dangerous the world is now and how a family of six out on the road wasn't going to be easy. That leaving was the worst thing that they could do.

She couldn't take it any more. Without another word, she spun on her heal, knocking her chair over in her abruptness, and stormed out of the room.

* * *

It was over and hour later, after dinner had been cleaned up and put away, that someone finally came to find her. She heard a rapping on the window.

"Ay," she said without bothering to look who it was.

There was the sound of the window sliding open and a small creak from the frame as someone climbed through the open square.

"Yer mother would have a right fit if she knew you were out here."

Though he'd done it a hundred times, Merida had always found it a wonder that her dad could fit through her small window. She supposed it was form all the practice. All the times he'd come out to find her here.

"Ay," she repeated dully. She wasn't interested in conversation and couldn't care less what her mother thought.

She heard her dad let out a sigh.

They were out on the small ledge of roof outside her bedroom window. She'd pulled her knees up so she could rest her crossed arms atop them, creating the perfect shelf for her chin. The sun had gone down by then, leaving their only light to be the stars and the couple of candles Elinor had burning throughout the house. She came out here often. It was a great place to think, if that was what she was in the mind for. It was an even better place to stop thinking. To let the mess of thoughts and worry drain out through your ears as you gazed up at the endless night sky. Merida had found herself coming out here more frequently ever since the epidemic hit and the world went to shit.

"Lass," Fergus started. Merida rolled her eyes. She knew this would be coming. "Yeh have to try to understand it from our side."

"The only side, apparently," she muttered.

Her father continued as if he hadn't heard her.

"You and yer brothers are the last thing your mother and I have in this world. Our family is the last thing any of us have. And we have to make sure it sticks together, no matter what. We can't lose each other."

He paused then, turning to stare out into the night as he let a stillness settle over the two of them. Merida knew this tactic well. Let the silence build until the other person can't stand it starts talking. She wasn't one to fall for something like that this time. Besides, she liked the quiet.

It was a while before Fergus started talking again.

"Yer mother is a strong woman. I know you may not think so," he added at Merida's eye roll, "but she is. She's done many a thing that I haven't had the heart for. But I really think that losing you. Losing any of her baibes, would break her. Break me, too. Family is first, Merida. Always remember that. First and foremost, before anything else, make sure your family is safe."

Merida could feel her father's eyes on her, looking for a reaction. She turned away from him, letting her cheek rest on her arms, and kept her mouth shut.

"Yeh have to understand, lassie. She just wants to protect you. Sometimes she goes about it the wrong way, and I know it doesn't seem like that's what she's doing most times, but it's the truth. She's like a bear, my Elinor. Doesn't let anything happen to her cubs."

He let out a chuckle at his own small joke. Merida refused to turn back to look at him again. Refused to say anything. When he realized he wasn't making any ground, Fergus let out a sigh as heavy as he.

"Just…make sure yer packed for tomorrow, lassie," he said, voice resigned as he turned to make his way back through the window. He gave her arm a small, meaningful squeeze before wriggling his large form through the restrictive window frame once more.

Merida heard the window slide shut and the heavy steps of her father as he continued out of her room and downstairs. She finally lifted her head again to rest her chin on her arms as silent stillness settled over her once more.

Very quietly, she wiped at her eyes and cheeks with the sleeve of her shirt, the fabric coming away wet under the night sky that was sprinkled with a thousand stars that seemed to stretch on forever.


	6. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five: Elsa**

She was alone. Nothing new there. She'd been alone for a long, long time. Alone and scared. if she had to sum up her life in two words, those would be it. Alone and scared.

That had never been the intention. To seclude her. To isolate her. It just sort of happened.

She'd always been a sickly child. Always on the brink of life and death. For most of her life, she'd been confined to her room, too sick to move or exert herself. When it first started, her parents had reduced the staff, limited her contact with people, and kept her ill health hidden from everyone. Including Anna. They hadn't wanted the press to find out. Hadn't wanted the info that the heads of a big and powerful company had a sickly daughter. She would've been ostracized. He face, name, and story plastered across every front page. Her parents had only tried to protect her from all that. Protected her from the press, the unwanted attention, the hounding paparazzi. She knew that. She knew it had been for her own good. But that didn't make being alone any easier to handle.

And then there was Anna. Elsa had been separated from her sister ever since her ill health had started. The thought was that it would only be temporary. That she'd get better soon enough. In the mean time, they simply hadn't wanted to worry Anna. So they locked Elsa away and kept Anna at bay.

Only, it wasn't temporary. Elsa did not get better quickly. A few weeks of ill health turned into months. Months turned into years. The lie kept getting bigger and bigger. Elsa was confined to her room, whether she was well enough to leave or not. No one could find out how sick she was, not even Anna. And Elsa had gone along with it.

She didn't know why she'd agreed. Agreed to be locked away like some animal or monster. Agreed to be isolated and alone. Agreed to be separated from her sister for so long. Her parents had only meant well, but look at what "well meant" did.

She regretted it now. Regretted to going along with their choice to keep her locked away and alone. She was alone now. Just as she had been for the past thirteen years. Alone and scared. Her room was empty no more nurses. No more doctors. Just her. In her room. Burning up from the fever. Terrified of what she'd turned into after the coma hit. Alone.

She wished she had someone there with her now. Maybe then she wouldn't be so scared.

But she couldn't. She couldn't let Anna in. Couldn't risk even the smallest chance that Anna would catch the virus from her, despite the fact that her sister had been immune until now. Couldn't risk the chance of her turning into, into one of those…_things _while her sister was near. She just couldn't. Anna was her only family left. She had to protect her in the only way she could. By keeping the door shut and keeping Anna away.

Even though she wished more than anything that she didn't have to.

The worst part about all of this wasn't even the fact that she had caught the virus. It was the she'd been getting better. After years of a poor immune system and teetering on the edge of death, she was finally getting better.

It was the doctor. A Mr. Bodhi Mann. He'd introduced a new treatment. One that was making her stronger, making her healthier. She hadn't been sick in weeks, thanks to him. She was getting better. The thought of a life beyond her bedroom walls was becoming real. She was going to be out in the world. She wasn't have to be alone anymore.

That is, until the virus hit. At first, they couldn't tell what it was. Even Dr. Mann was at a loss. All they knew was that she was burning up. Her eyes fogged over and her skin grew pale. She had shortness of breath and her skin began to sag. It was an unknown disease. It was new. It was strange. It was terrifying.

And then it was on the news. This virus. This HSE disease. What would eventually be called "the zombie virus." Apparently, she wasn't the only one to have caught it. There were reports of it across the globe. Reports from London. Bangkok. New York. Sydney. Tokyo. It was everywhere. And there was no cure.

At least they knew what was happening to her, now. It was only a matter of time before she'd pass into a coma, just like every other patient. And then she'd rise from the dead, clawing and biting like some animal. She'd turn into a monster. That was a fact.

Soon, Dr. Mann stopped coming for her regular check-ups. The maids and the cooks stopped coming to work not long after. The world was in a panic. The epidemic was everywhere. The schools closed. Then the hospitals. Then the news stations shut down. Any method of transportation in or out of the country was impossible. They couldn't risk the infection spreading further than it already had. There were riots in the streets. Storied of people attacking each other. Killing each other. _Eating_ each other. It was chaos. It was fear and confusion. It was the infection.

And then, the unthinkable happened. Their parents caught it. Elsa could do nothing as she heard her sister say those words through her closed door.

"They're sick, Elsa."

At least they didn't have to suffer long. They succumbed to the coma and its aftereffects quick enough. The virus was funny like that. For some, the infection would last for months before the coma hit. For others, merely hours.

Elsa never knew what happened to her parents after the coma part of the infection left them. She never found out what Anna had to do when their parents suddenly started attacking their daughter, scratching and biting wherever they could reach at. She never knew. Never found out. She never wanted to.

It wasn't too long before Elsa succumbed to the coma, herself. As she lay there in bed, staring at her ceiling, her skin on fire as she felt as the virus began to cook her insides, she thought of her sister. Anna. More than anything, she wished she could've opened her door, for once in her life. Let her sister in. Let her know what had been happening to her. She wished she'd been able to play with her like they'd always used to when they were younger. They used to be best buddies. And now, they weren't. And thanks to this stupid virus, they never could be again.

Tears ran down her face, the coolness of them welcome when in contrast to her burning skin. If she'd had the strength, she would have screamed. Would've shouted to the heavens at the injustice of it all. She never had a childhood. Never had friends. Never knew a look on her parents' faces that wasn't fear or worry that she'd drop dead the next day. Never had a chance to get to know her had a life of her own.

And now, she never would. Looking back, it was ridiculous to think that she'd ever had a chance at living a normal life. Of being healthy and care free. It'd always been a pipe-dream. Some unreachable goal that was beyond impossible.

Finally, it'd caught up to her. Her ill health had reached a point of no return. She was sick. And she was never getting better.

One last tear rolled out of the side of Elsa's eye to soak into the fabric of her pillow before she closed her eyes and let the virus over-take her.

* * *

There were dreams. Images that flashed before her.

It's a little known fact that people still dream while in a coma. Their brains are still active enough to create, random sparks of code and information that we can interpret as sounds and images. That was what she was seeing now.

_Two girls, running through the forest. A sleigh in each set of hands as they bounded through the snow. Elsa__'__s heart soared as a smile stretched her face._

_ "__Anna, wait!__" __she called with a laugh. __"__You__'__re going too fast!__"_

_ "__Come on Elsa!__" __her sister shouted over her shoulder. __"__Let__'__s build a snowman!__"_

_ They continued to run, ignoring the chill, winter air that bit at their cheeks and nipped at their noses._

_ Laughter rang out like Christmas bells through the trees._

_—_

_ She crept towards the door. Her parents were in the other room, talking in hushed voices. There was a third person. A doctor._

_ "__We__'__ll protect her. We will limit her contact with people. Keep away the press. Limit the staff and close our doors to the public. The less we put her through, the better.__"_

_ It was her father. He sounded scared. She didn__'__t know why he was scared. Maybe it had something to do with the papers the doctor had. __"__Reports,__" __he__'__d called them._

_—_

_She was crying. Sobbing and screaming at the doctors and nurses that filled her room. _

_ "__Stay away from me!__" __she yelled. A nurse came at her with a needle._

_ She screamed and kicked her away. _

_ "__No, no, no! No more tests! It hurts!__"_

_ They__'__d had to call her parents. _

_ "__Elsa, honey, look at me,__" __her dad said, holding her shoulders, not letting her move._

_ "__I know it hurts, but it__'__s the only way they can help you. It__'__s the only way you can get better. Do you understand that?__"_

_ Tears streamed down her face._

_ "__But Daddy, it hurts!__"_

_ "__Then you have to conceal it,__" __he said, his voice filled with pain at having to watch his daughter in so much agony. __"__If you lock away the pain, it__'__ll go away. Don__'__t feel it. Don__'__t let it show. But, Elsa, dear, you have to let them do their tests. It__'__s the only way to help you. Can you do that for me?__"_

_ She sniffed. Her eyes were still streaming and her arm still stung from where the nurse had poked her. She looked over at the sharp, metal tool on the tray next to her bed and then back to her father._

_ With another sniff, she nodded._

_—_

_A dark man with black hair sat at her bedside. She held out her arm, ready for a needle filled with green medicine. She__'__d grown out of the tantrums and screaming years ago. _

_ "__Dr. Mann?__" __she asked, disrupting the quite of the room._

_ "__Yes, my dear?__"_

_ "__Do you think I'll be able to see my sister again?__"_

_ The doctor froze as he reached for his syringe. A small smile tugged at his mouth, before continuing to move to pick up the needle._

_ "__Absolutely. I do think, my dear, that you shall be completely healthy in no time.__"_

_ Elsa smiled at the thought as she laid back on her pillow and let Dr. Mann swab her arm with alcohol. She showed no reaction as the doctor slid the needle into her skin. Over the years, the pin-pricks and injections never hurt any less. She__'__d just gotten better at concealing the pain._

* * *

She opened her eyes. Shadows were spread across the ceiling as light streamed in from her window. It was dead silent, the only sound being her breathing to fill the still air. She blinked. Her fever was gone, the heat and sweat from her skin having disappeared. She blinked again.

_What?_

Was this another dream? No. It couldn't be. Everything was so real, so solid. She sat up, letting the covers fall away from her. She instantly regretted moving as a agonizing pain shot through her skull. Her hand shot to her head and her shoulders hunched over. She took a few seconds, quickly dealing with the pain and repressing it as best she could. Head still pounding, she stood and made her way towards her door.

On her way, she glanced at herself in a mirror hanging on the wall. She stopped in her tracks.

_What?_

She stumbled towards the mirror, her mind confused by what it was seeing.

Her hair was white. Like snow. Her eyes were bright blue. Like ice.

That didn't make sense. This was not what she looked like. She was supposed to have her mother's hair and her father's eyes. What was in the mirror was not her face. She reached up and ran her fingers through her hair. Her reflection copied her. She blinked. The reflection blinked.

Thoughts whirled in her head. A memory or two of news reports saying that those that had woken from teh HSE coma all had birght blue, dead eyes. Some of the infected had clumps fo white hair, turned britle and dead by the virus. That couldn't be what had happened to her, could it? No, that didn't make sense. She felt fine, she hadn't turned into one of those...things. She wasn't dead. Plus, she'd never seen a picture of an infected person with a full head of white hair, like hers.

_What is going on?_

Mind reeling, headache still pounding, Elsa pulled away from the mirror and staggered to her door to fiddle with the lock. Aside from the torture of a headache, her head was fuzzy. Her limbs were heavy and her thoughts slow. It felt as if she'd just woken up from a long, afternoon nap. Only the feeling was magnified tenfold.

Elsa staggered her way to the top of the stairs, and gripped the handrail to support her shaking legs as she made her way down the steps.

The house was silent, devoid of any sounds or life. She couldn't help but wonder if her sister was still here or if she'd had already left. Elsa wondered just how long she'd been in that coma.

The house was still silent as the grave as she reached the bottom step. She glanced around and found everything in a slight order of disarray. It wasn't as if everything were trashed or anything like that. It was simply a lot less clean than what she was used to seeing. From what she could see, she couldn't find any signs that someone had been here recently. It all felt so…empty. Elsa could feel her heart sink as she realized that the house must have been abandoned.

"Elsa?"

She spun around, the sound startling her in the silence. She froze.

Right there, on the tile of the grad entry way at the bottom of the stairs, was Anna. She was standing there, shoulders and hands filled with bags and gear. Her eyes were wide, her face in a state of shock.

"Anna?" Elsa asked, a small laugh escaping her as relief flooded her chest. She wasn't alone after all.

Anna's face lit up. Her bags fell to the floor as she ran towards her sister and nearly tackled her to the ground in a bear hug.

"Oh, my God! You're alive!"

Elsa laughed as she wrapped her arms around her sister.

"I know!"

"You're okay! You're alive!" her sister repeated as she threatened to crush Elsa's rib-cage.

Elsa could only laugh as her relief overwhelmed her and tears started streaking down her face.

"Oh, my God!" Anna said again. "What—"

She pulled away suddenly to look at her sister from arms length, tears streaming down her face.

"How on Earth...? What? You're supposed to be _dead_!"

Elsa couldn't come up with words. She was at a loss, all she could do was shrug.

"I-I mean. Look at you! You survived! You're alright. My God, your hair! Your _eyes_!"

"I know," she said through her tears and laughter. She couldn't understand what had happened any better than her sister. She had no answers. No clues or hints. And quite honestly, she didn't care that she didn't have a clue. All she had was a working heart and thinking brain and her sister, standing right here in front of her. That was all she needed.

"What happened? No one has ever survived. How did you survive? "

"I don't know."

* * *

**A/N: guys. guys. GUYS. Be still my heart, have you SEEN the newly released HTTYD2 clip of Hiccup and Astrid? HAVE YOU? If not, see it NOW, or so help me, my fandom powers will strike you down. These two lil' shits. Are the cutest fucking thing I've ever seen. (And I'm not one for a hetero ship, usually. (no hate, I swear, just usually can****'****t find a good one that i like)) You see Astrid hold out her hand when Hic starts talking and he just gives her his pencil like they've done it a mill times before and they're so in ****sync**** and you can tell that they just KNOW each other and it's such a REAL relationship thing they got goin on and I JUST CAN'T. To be honest, never been much of a Hicstrid shipper, but fuck. This clip. This **_**ship. **_**New OTP. Drowning in feels. Pls send help. **


	7. Chapter 6

**Chapter Six: Rapunzel**

She was shaking. Only it was more than just a simple shiver. More than the nervous shakes you get when you have to present in front of other people. Or the jitters you get when you're about to go on that huge ride at the amusement park, fear and excitement mixed together until your fingers can't stay still. More than any of that.

She was shaking to her core. Like a building during an earthquake. The walls crumbling, the foundation weakened, windows shattering, support beams snapping. That was her. A building. Disintegrating as the world fell around her.

It'd been two days. Two full cycles of sunlight streaming in through the bathroom window and darkness coming soon after to swallow the light whole. Two days and she hadn't moved. Two days, and her body had managed to stop shaking, but her mind was still ricocheting inside her skull. Shaken to the core. Two days and all she'd had for sleep were the few minutes where she'd dozed off in the bathtub. Two days with no food and her only water coming from stollen drinks from the sink. Two days that she'd spent with blood stained clothing and a rusty frying pan as her only comfort. Two days since her own mother had attacked her and she'd had no choice but to fight back.

Her mother had been sick for weeks now. With what, she wasn't sure. It wasn't like any cold or flu she'd experienced before. She had an incredibly high fever. Her eyes had fogged over and her skin had begun to sag a bit more than her normal wrinkles and bags.

Her mother hadn't left her leave the house to get help. This wasn't out of the ordinary. Rapunzel's mother had refused to let her leave the house on multiple occasions. Rapunzel had grown up on stories of murders, thugs, rapists, and all the other bad things to be scared of out there in the world.

So, they'd had to make do with what they had. Ice packs and aspirins being the only things they had to work with. It wasn't until her mother had fallen asleep and hadn't woken up that she began to worry.

It'd been a full day, and her mother still hadn't woken up. Rapunzel checked her pulse. Checked her breathing. Checked her heart rate, her blood pressure, and her response to light. Nothing showed any sign of life.

It was then she went into full tilt panic mode. She screamed. She cried. She ran around the house, toppling tables and cabinets in a whirlwind of anger, panic and confusion. She didn't know what to do. She couldn't call 911. Her mother had told her to never call that number. She'd told Rapunzel that if a policeman ever found her, she'd be taken away.

She could go outside for help, her mother had told her not to leave. She'd never left the ouse on her own. Not even to go to school. She'd been homeschooled all her life.

They had no internet connection. No tv or computer. She had nowhere to go. She had nothing. She didn't have anyone to call or contact. She didn't know what to do. Her mother was dead. All she could do was cry and scream.

It was the fourth day after her mother had died that Rapunzel found herself locked in the bathroom.

She'd been in the kitchen, making a grilled cheese, while the corpse of her mother continued to rest in the other room.

She'd been numb for the last day. Her tears all spent and her throat al screamed out. There was nothing left. She had nothing left but to continue living as the corpse of her mother slept in the next room over.

The snap and sizzle of the sandwich filled the kitchen. The sound was the only thing she could here as she stood over the stove, mind numb and distracted by the sizzling sandwich in front of her.

She almost didn't hear the shuffling and moaning until it was too late. She turned to find her mother—or what was left of her—in the kitchen doorway. Rapunzel found herself frozen to the spot. She couldn't believe what she was seeing. Her mother had been _dead._ But now she wasn't.

The moment didn't last long. In the next split second, her mother lunged at her, arms outstretched. Rapunzel leaped away with a squeal, forgetting to let go of the frying pan in her panic and sending cooked bread and melted cheese to skate across the kitchen floor.

"Mother!" she shrieked.

Her mother had never come at her like this before. Sure, there was the occasional swat with a hair brush. The here and there grip of the wrist that was a bit too tight. But never an all out attack.

"What are you doing?" Rapunzel asked, panic and confusion coursing through her. Her mother was dead, but not dead. Her mother was dead, but standing here, _attacking_ her, with unnaturally pale white skin, and a contorted face. She was moaning, spitting out intelligible words, instead of the usual string insults and reprimands. Her eyes were open, but they were dead, the pupils turned an unnaturally bright blue that was devoid of a soul. They were empty. Whatever this thing was, it was not her mother.

The corpse lunged again, teeth gnashing, fingers clawed.

Without thinking, Rapunzel spun out of the way, her arm coming around, frying pan still in hand. There was a _Klang! _iron connected with skull. Rapunzel felt as bone fractured under the weight of her pan and sent her mother forward for her head to connect a second time with the sharp corner of the counter-top. The body of her mother fell to the floor with a thick thud, blood leaking out form her head to fill the cracks and spaces of the tile with crimson.

Rapunzel stood there, her breathing fast, her heart racing, as she looked at the body of her mother on the kitchen floor. Lightning raced through her veins as she tried to comprehend what had just happened. She was soon overrun by panic, as well. Panic as the blood that spread across the kitchen tile filled her vision. Panic that her mother might get up and attack again. Panic as she looked at the crater in her mother's skull that she'd created.

_Dear, God. _

She had just killed her own mother.

She blacked out.

The nest thing she remembered was that she was sitting in the upstairs bathtub with the bathroom door locked and the frying pan still in her hands as her body shook uncontrollably.

Over the next forty-eight hours, he teeth had stopped chattering and she could hold her fingers still enough to turn on the bathroom sink. She'd refused to unlock the door, though. Refused to step outside from fear of what she'd find. She'd spent the last two days, terrified out of her mind and she wasn't about to leave the sanctity of the bathroom until she had to.

It was sometime in the late afternoon on the second day, when she was starting to doze off in the the bathtub again, that Rapunzel heard a crash from downstairs. She was instantly snapped out of her daze, senses on high alert as she gripped her frying pan.

She could hear more noises from downstairs.

There were voices.

"Hey! Single zed. Kitchen."

"Dead or fed?"

"Dead, far as I can tell."

The voices continued, muffled by the floor between them and her. There were more crashes and sounds. From what she heard, she figured her mother had stayed dead, her body laid out on the cracked kitchen tiles.

But it looked like that wasn't the most pressing problem any more.

Rapunzel gripped the handle of her frying pan in her fingers and she strained to listen to the noises downstairs, praying that whoever these strangers where, that they would decide to stay downstairs. She nearly jumped out of her skin as the handle to the bathroom door jiggled.

She continued to sit in the bath tub, eyes wide, heart pounding, as her fingers twisted the handle of the frying pan and she stared at the bathroom door set in the wall opposite the bathtub. The jiggling stopped. She held her breath, waiting to see if they'd go away.

Suddenly, there was a _Bang!_ as something large and heavy connected with the door.

This time, Rapunzel jumped right out of the bathtub at the noise. She was across the tiny bathroom in a second. The counter under the mirror was on a wall between the one with the tub and the one with the door. The counter was on the side of the door with the hinges, so that when the door opened, it opened towards the counter, blocking the entrant's view of the counter and mirror.

Rapunzel had crawled atop the counter and now sat crouching was she faced the door, frying pan gripped tight as the pounding continued to come from the other side. She jumped as the bolt finally gave, the wood splintering as the side of the door broke free.

The door creaked open slowly towards the counter and Rapunzel's hiding place, each second that passed only making her heart race faster. There was the soft _thud, thud_ of boots on flooring as the stranger on the other side of the door crept forward. The stranger finally cleared the door, head turned away to reveal a head of long-ish brunette hair.

The stranger let out a sigh.

"Ah, alone at—"

Rapunel's arm shot out, frying pan connecting with skull for the second time to send the limp body of a man to the floor.

She froze as she realized the noises and sounds from downstairs had stopped. She'd forgotten that there had been more than one voice downstairs. And the sound of her frying pan hitting someone's head had made a lot more noise than she'd expected.

There was the sound of footsteps on stairs. Her heart began to pick up speed again. She held her frying pan out in front of her like a sword, preparing herself for whomever else was going to come from the other side of that door.

The footsteps neared, then slowed. Rapunzel could tell that they were right outside the door now. She held her breath at the sound of careful steps, her view still hidden by the open door.

The first thing she saw come into view from the other side of the door was the end of a metal pole, held flat. Soon to follow was the boy that was holding it.

He glanced down at the unconscious form of the first man, and then looked up to find Rapunzel, still crouched with her frying pan clutched in front of her.

He was skinny. But not in a way that was lanky. He just…looked like he hadn't had a good meal in a while. Maybe it was the oversized brown coat he was wearing. It was old, torn, and stained dark in some places. His hair was a chocolate brown that looked like it was in a permanent state of bed-head. His eyes were a warm, honey brown. Kind and inviting. Rapunzel was still holding her frying pan out, arms shaking with her elbows locked.

He froze when he saw her, face blank, eyes wide. But it only lasted for a second. He blinked, glanced back down to the body on the floor and then up to Rapunzel. He looked at the frying pan in her hands, pointed directly at him.

What he did next took her by surprise.

He laughed. A rolling, joyful laugh that seemed way too out of place for a tiny, cramped, and dank bathroom with a body on the floor.

"Hey, Bunny!" he called out the bathroom door.

Rapunzel's heart picked up speed as she heard an "Oi!" respond from downstairs. There were more than just two of them. Who knew how many there'd be waiting for her downstairs. They were robbers, most likely. Ruffians, thugs. All things her mother had warned her about. And now here they were, in her home, in her bathroom.

"Remember how you always said Flynn needed to check the corners first? I think he's finally learned his lesson!"

Rapunzel could hear a crash and then heavy footsteps from downstairs. She was breathing fast, her heart racing at the thought of another one coming up here.

The brown-haired stranger turned to look at the unconscious form on the floor again.

"Well," he said to her, giving the body a nudge with his foot as he let out a chuckle. "Looks like you're a princess that doesn't need much saving."

He looked up at her then, eyes bright, smile wide as he seemed completely oblivious to the panic she was experiencing.

"Name's Jack, by the way. Jack Frost. And this here," he gestured towards the body, "is my friend Flynn."

* * *

**A/N: Heyyyyyy. So, I know I'm updating a tad later on this story than I have the other chapters. (Finals are a b*tch, btw.) But I'm back and finals free! So I decided to give you two chapters instead of one, just to make up for lost time. XD everyone's introduced now *whew* so an actual story line is soon to follow (and yay! they're finding each other!) so stay tuned and I hope you like it! ^.^**


	8. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7: Family Vacation**

_Thwunk!_

The arrow hit its mark with a satisfying sound. As if there was any doubt that it would.

Merida smirked, making her way through the trees and branches. With a tug, she yanked her arrow out of the trunk, bringing the dead squirrel with it. With another tug, the squirrel came off the end of the arrow, skull shattered, head lolling.

Merida wiped her arrow on her pants and sheathed it back into her quiver. She then pulled out her knife and a plastic shopping bag and squatted at the base of her tree and set to work skinning and gutting her kill.

The DunBrochs had been on the road for nearly a month now. Their plan of survival so far had been to migrate from house to house. To find an abandoned house that had yet to be raided or destroyed and to hunker down inside. The routine was the same. clear out the house of any sickos or corpses. Make sure the door had a working lock. Board up the house, block out the windows and nail shut every door save the front door and the back door for a quick escape. Then, stay in the house, raiding the pantries and store rooms until the food was almost gone. Once they only had a few days worth of food left, they'd leave to find their next retrieve.

They'd managed to find a neighborhood. It hadn't been too far from their home in the woods. They were still near the heart of Ohio. The neighborhood was middle class, pretty well-to-do. Completely abandoned and an absolute gold-mine. All it had were a few sickos here and there, but nothing they couldn't handle between Merida and her Dah'd. They'd been hoping from house to house, clearing out the neighborhood street by street.

The nights were probably the hardest. Elinor would tuck the boys in. Sing them some stupid song that she had used to sing to Merida when she was younger to make them go to sleep. Then the shifts would start in. Merida, Elinor, Furgus. That was the order every night. Whoever was on duty kept watch. Either on the roof of the house or by the front door, they'd keep an eye out for the sickos. The goal was not to pick them off. That would draw too much attention to their hide-out. Besides, they'd stay away so long as the DunBrochs kept quiet. (They'd found out son enough that noises attracted the sickos, pulling them in like dogs working on instincts.) The goal was to make sure they stayed scant. Make sure a group or hoard of them wasn't near by.

Once or twice they'd caught a whole bunch of them on the move together, and they'd had to grab the boys and sneak out the back door. They made it to the other side of the neighborhood, managing to find another house to camp out in before sunrise.

Merida had managed to skin the squirrel and string its hide onto her belt. She'd cut up the meat of tiny critter into squares and piled it into the plastic bag, which she'd also strung along her belt. She'd been preparing to move on when she heard a twig snap.

She froze, senses on high alert as she peeled her eyes for anything moving through the forest. She could smell it before she could hear it. The smell hit her like a brick to the face.

It was ghastly. This sickeningly sweat smell of rotting meat and deteriorating flesh.

The news reports had said that the sickos weren't technically dead. They weren't officially zombies. Merida had said that was bullshit. Because there was no way something that wasn't dead could smell this bad. It was like week-old road kill, only worse. It was like someone had slitted a rats belly, stuffed it full of rotten eggs, covered it in sticky syrup and left it to bake in the sun amidst a compost heap. It was repulsive.

Then she heard it. A shambling mess of limbs being dragged across the grass and leaves and through the brush and trees. That was another thing she didn't get. If they weren't zombies, why the bloody hell did they walk like them? The raspy breathing told her that it was getting closer. Merida's heart beat hitched up a notch.

Very, very quietly, Merida pulled an arrow from her quiver and strung it in her bow. She turned towards the direction the sound and smell was coming from. It wasn't long until it came into view. The sicko. It was pale. Like it'd been drained of its blood. It's skin paper thin and sagging. To Merida, it looked like it used to be a kid. Some teen with bright clothes and earbuds still dangling from its ears.

It was a girl. Must've been around sixteen when she turned. Merida couldn't be sure. It was always hard to tell with these things, with their skin sagging and pealing and rotting. She was someone's daughter at some point. Just like Merida was. She had been someone's sister, best friend, girlfriend. And now she was this. This dead thing that only killed and ate. This dead thing that was missing and arm and half a face, the half-visible jaw working at empty air as it caught on to Merida's scent, its decomposing noes sniffing at the air.

The girl could've only been a year or two younger than Merida. Merida couldn't tell if she'd been bitten or caught the virus early on like most everyone else. It didn't really matter now, anyways. All that mattered was this girl was a sick animal that would kill whenever she got the chance. And Merida knew that if she wasn't careful, she'd end up just like her.

Merida waited, her breath bated until she had a clear shot. And then, the sicko turned, eyes an unnatural, dead blue turning to land on her like some demented spotlight.

_Thwunk!_

Another bullseye.

* * *

"Merida!"

She rolled her eyes and threw the bag of squirrel meat onto the table near the front door of the house they'd "commandeered" before disarming herself. She knew this'd be coming. She swung her bow off of her shoulder and set about to unbuckling her quiver.

"Where on Earth have you been?!" Her mother hollered, storming out of the kitchen to come face to face with her daughter, face livid. Merida didn't see her brothers or Dah'd in the entryway or the connecting living room. She figured they must be somewhere out back, learning to fight with a broadsword, or taking target practice, or something as equally exciting. Her father had always had a hobby of medieval weaponry and fighting. Mum had never quite approved, but it looked like all her nagging had been for not considering how useful skills like those had turned out.

"_Out_, Mum!" Merida said, as irritated as her mother, putting emphasis on the word "out" to let her know that she didn't have to tell her mother every time she left the bloody house. She wasn't twelve anymore. Merida glanced up from her unbuckling to find eyes that burned into her. She gave a sigh before giving a more suitable answer. "Lookin' fer food."

"We have food," her mother responded, not missing a beat.

"Then lookin' fer some sport!" Merida yelled, her temper spilling over as she slung off her quiver and slammed it down onto the table. She snatched up the squirrel meat and stormed past her mother towards the kitchen. Elinor was less than a step behind her.

"Merida, you've been gone for hours! You cannot leave our sight, do you understand me?"

"Yeh can't cage meh! I am not an animal!" Merida spun around to face her mother, fiery curls flying, the effect only adding to her anger. Elinor was unfazed.

"Well those things out there _are_." she said, pointing towards the front door. "And they will tear you apart—"

"Yeh think Aye don' know that?!"

"Then why do you go out there? Why do you leave if you know you could be killed?"

"Because Aye can't take it anymore, Mum!" Merida screamed, throwing the bag in her hands in frustration. It flew to explode on the kitchen wall, sending squares of meat all over the tiled kitchen floor. Elinor was stunned into silence, for once giving her daughter a moment's time to speak.

"Yeh keep telling the boys i's a 'vacation.' Yeh keep sayin' 'oh, i's jus' a wee trip.' But i's not!" Merida continued, throwing her hands about, pacing in the tiny kitchen. "All i's been is us! Just us! Aye've no peace, no tyme fer meself. Aye've no _freedom_!"

Merida put emphasis on the last word, the desperation in her want of it making her voice break.

"Yeh won' let me bee! I can't take being locked up wit yeh anymore! I need to get ou' thear or else Aye'll go mad!"

"Are you willing to pay the price your freedom will cost—?"

"Arghh!"

Elinor had recovered quickly, starting in on her reprimand once more. Merida shoved past her, making her way towards the hallway that would lead to her room, and hopefully an escape. Elinor ignored her daughter protests, following her through the house.

"If you die out there, your father and I—"

"Mum!"

"would be devastated. You to stay where we can protect you—"

Merida spun around in the doorway of the room she'd claimed as hers.

"Aye. Can. _Protect_. Maiself," she said pointedly, her voice low as she did her best to reign in her anger.

Her mother wasn't convinced.

"What if something happens to you out there?!"

"Then it does!" Merida exploded once more, slamming the palm of her hand against the door frame.

"Then it happens an' Aye'm dead or turned intah a sicko!" she continued before her mother could start up again. "But wha'ever it is, i's better than bein' locked up in wha'ever house we find next! I's better than this! I's better than spendin' any more tyme with _you_!"

And with that, Merida slammed the door shut in her mother's stunned face.

She clenched her hands, her shoulders shook. She was just so _angry_. Why wouldn't her mother just listen to her? Why couldn't she leaver her alone for five bloody minutes? Her angry boiled over. A high pitched scream erupted from her as she moved to topple over a bookcase that had been left in the room by whatever sorry sod that had lived there first. Books went flying, pages scattering, stories strewn throughout the room. Merida ran her fingers through her hair, the knots and tangles stopping them before long, leaving her to pull at her hair in frustration as she threw herself on the bed and let out another scream into the pillow.

Elinor listened to her daughter's tantrum form the other side of the door, frozen in a stunned silence by what her daughter had said. She turned around letting her back fall against the door was her knees went weak. She covered her mouth with her hand as tears threatened at the edge of her vision as her daughter's words rang in her ears..

_"__I__'__s better than spendin__' __any more tyme with _you_!__"_


	9. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8: Not Lookin' Too Good**

Two weeks. That's how long they'd been on the road. Two weeks. Fourteen days. Three-hundred-and-thirty-six hours. Twenty-thousand-one-hundred-and-sixty minutes. One-million-two-hundred-nine-thousand-six-hundred seconds. One-million-two-hundred-nine-thousand-six-hundred seconds seconds since they'd left Michigan. One-million-two-hundred-nine-thousand-six-hundred seconds seconds they'd been on the road.

That's two weeks since Hiccup had seen his childhood home burn to the ground and left the only place he'd ever known.

Hiccup and Toothless had done little else but walk. Walk and travel. Walk and travel. Travel and walk. Travel and walk.

Hiccup would've liked to drive, had they been able to. But every time he started up a car and got it moving, it wasn't long until the roads lead them to a town or city where the cars left abandoned were packed so tight, there was barely enough room to walk between them, much less drive. So the two were left to walk most of the time. A boy and his dog, backpacking it across the country.

Every night, they'd set up camp with what supplies they had, either barricading themselves in some abandoned car or house, or when they had no other choice, setting up a tent by the side of the road, camouflaging it against the infected and possible marauders as best they could with branches and mud.

After camp was set up, the two would eat, with Hiccup cooking food for the both of them. He'd spoon the beans or veggies or meat right out of the can with the two of them laid out in the grass outside their tent as they watched the sun set every evening. One scoop for him. Then one scoop for Toothless, the dog lapping it straight off the spoon, with Hiccup giving it not one thought. The pattern continuing until the designated one can for the night was gone.

Then they'd take a good twenty or thirty minutes to just do…whatever. If the day hadn't been too long or tiring, they'd play catch. Hiccup throwing a battered ball or broken branch across some abandoned stretch of interstate for Toothless to retrieve, enthusiasm abounding, until the sun finally set, submerging the pair in uninterrupted darkness.

Days like that were not the norm. More often than most, they'd end the day exhausted. Most days consisted of the pair covering twenty to thirty miles in a day. More than once, they'd come across a wrecked city or pile-up of cars that usually required climbing or sorting through rubble to find a safe path. Not to mention the number of times they'd ended up running or fighting for their lives amongst a collection of the infected.

It was days like those, the long, arduous days that could leave Hiccup weak at the knees, or Toothless with scraped and bloody paw pads. The days were the only thing that seemed to matter was to keep moving forward. To keep plunging on. To follow the maps. Aim for D.C. Just keep your eyes straight ahead. Don't think of today, don't think of tomorrow, don't think of yesterday. Just think of moving forward.

It was those days were the two would just continue to sit under a clear sky outside their tent after they'd finished their can and their fire began to die down. It was those days that Hiccup would talk. He'd talk and talk to Toothless as if the dog could understand every word. And there were times when Hiccup swore he could. He'd talk about anything. He'd talk about everything. The most recurring topic being that of his mother. Now and then, he'd talk about his father, though he tried to stay away from the subject, the memories still recent enough to rub his voice raw and make his eyes sting.

When the topic of his father did come up, Hiccup could only find good things to say. He'd talk about a fight they'd had and how he realized that his father was somewhat right in his argument. Or he'd mention how much he wished they'd been able to just drop it all together. For the year or two before the epidemic hit, that's all Hiccup and his father seemed able to do. Fight. Fight about this. Fight about that. Fight about how Hiccup should join sports. Fight about Hiccup leaving for college two years early. Fight about how much they fought. Day in and day out, it only seemed to grow worse with time.

Looking back, Hiccup wished with his whole heart that they would've fought just a little less. That they could've gotten along better. Like they used to when Hiccup had been younger. Father and son against the world.

But more often than not, the subject would fall to his mother. A woman that had left Hiccup and his father when Hiccup was still barely tall enough to reach the top shelf in the refrigerator. A woman that had meant everything to Hiccup when he was younger. And now, Hiccup wasn't sure if this was a woman that still even mattered.

It'd been two weeks. Two weeks Hiccup and Toothless had been out on the road. Two weeks sine they escaped from the raging inferno that they had once called home.

Dinner had finished. The fire was burning down and the can of Bush's Baked Beans was empty. Hiccup chucked the tin can as far as he could into the woods next to the interstate they were camping out by. Littering and global warming used to be an issue. Something that was all over the new, taught in schools, discussed in important debates. The future of the environment. The future of the world. Well, the world had gone to shit and it looked like that's how it's future was going to end up as well. Hiccup couldn't give two shits about littering. If anything, maybe some infected bastard would trip on the can and break its neck.

After dinner had been cleaned up, Hiccup and Toothless settled in. Today had been a long one. Thirty-two miles, from what Hiccup could determine. Some of it over army barricades that had been set up as an attempt to keep the infected at bay, only to be abandoned days later. Hiccup propped himself up against one of the supports of their tent and lifted his arm for Toothless to snuggle on up to him and rest his furry head in Hiccup's lap.

After a few moments of silence and watching as the sun began to sink towards the horizon, Hiccup dug his hand into his pocket and fished out the small picture. The picture of a woman with greying hair and eyes like his. A woman that had left Hiccup and his father when Hiccup was still barely tall enough to reach the top shelf in the refrigerator.

The picture had been folded and unfolded over a hundred times in the past two weeks. It was beat up, dirty, cracked and wrinkled. Even torn in one place. But it was still clear. Clear enough to show the woman smiling on the front. His mother.

Hiccup let out a sigh and turned the picture over to reveal the message on the back.

_Washington, D.C. Come find me when you're ready._

_Be brave, my little viking._

"Toothless, are we doing the right thing?" he finally asked, breaking the silence of the late evening sunset. "Going to D.C. to find her?"

His response was a pair of concerned green eyes looking back up at him, accompanied by a small whine that told him that the lab would fallow him to the ends of the Earth. Hiccup looked down and smiled at his friend. He let his hand fall to ruffle the black lab's scruffy head.

"I mean, I don't even know her," he said, still running his fingers over Toothless's head as the dog's tail began to whip back and forth happily. Hiccup turned the picture over again to the front, looking at his mother as she continued to smile pointlessly at the sky.

"I remember when she left. I woke up one morning and she was just…gone. I knew first thing that morning that she wasn't there any more. I knew because she'd always wake me up laughing and giggling. She'd come in, and snatch me out of my bed. Pick me up and pretend to fly me around my room, calling me a dragon rider, laughing the whole time. Then she'd take me out to the kitchen and we'd all sit down together and have breakfast with my dad there and we were a real family, you know? Not just some sit-com, or some sappy Disney family. A real one.

"And then, one day, she never came in to my room to wake me up. I remember coming out of my room sometime in the morning and finding my dad at the kitchen table, eyes red, shoulders slumped. I never asked what had happened. I just knew Mom was gone.

"She left this under my pillow," Hiccups said gesturing towards the picture in his hands. His eyes had begun to tear up, his nose starting to run. "Like some twisted gift from the tooth-fairy. Letting some six-year-old know his mother had left him and not telling him why." His voice cracked and Hiccup's words came stumbling to a stop.

He looked down at the picture in his hands. He swallowed and pushed back his tears.

"It doesn't matter, anyways," he said as he folded up the picture again.

"It's the only place we have left to go, right Bud?" he asked looking down at Toothless again as he slid the picture back into his pocket.

Toothless let out a happy bark in agreement and leapt up to lick at Hiccup's face. He laughed, wrapping his arms around his best friend and reveling in the comfort of knowing he had at least one last soul that cared about him.

* * *

Later that night, Hiccup woke the both of them with a fit of coughing. The two slept together in the sanctity of their tent, both relying on Toothless's senses to wake them if one of the infected came by. The coughing fit was harsher than the others, loud enough to wake Toothless and rattle the tent.

After the coughing had died down, Hiccup pulled away and looked at the palm of the hand he'd been coughing into. It was speckled with blood.

As the pair had continued to travel over the last two weeks, it became apparent to Hiccup that they were about to encounter some serious issues. Or more specifically, _he_ was about to encounter some serious issues.

The blisters and burns from the fire had yet to heal since they'd left the house, especially the ones at the end of Hiccup's stump caused by his metal prosthetic. He had tended to them as best he could, which wasn't too good, considering the fact that he'd neglected to pack any medical supplies. They weren't able to scavenge any, either. They'd tried their best to keep out of towns as much as possible. Those were dangerous. Areas that were originally highly populated were still populated, only not by humans, but by the walking dead. The best the two could do was raid one house with every town they'd come to, not being able to chance the danger of staying longer to raid others. Though this had been working so far in terms of finding food and a few other necessities, they had yet to find a single house that had any medical supplies.

Maybe it was just their luck. Maybe fate had dealt them a shitty hand. Maybe they just didn't know how to pick their houses.

Whatever it was, it meant Hiccup had two week old burns and wounds that had not been treated properly. And though he'd been studying medicine at uni before the hit of the HSE and knew quite a bit about how to treat a wound, there was only so much he could do with some-what clean water and some grungy strips of clothing. Almost all of his blisters had popped by this point, creating open wounds that were susceptible to infection. Having most of them where his prosthetic could dig in and rub them raw wasn't helping the wounds to heal any faster, either. His skin had started to swell in some places, creating angry, red blotches. A few of his burns and blisters had began to fester, filling with puss and bile, and lord only knew what else.

Not to mention the smoke that still rested in his lungs. When he was younger, Hiccup had been the geek of the school. The nerd, the dweeb, the embarrassing dork. The picture made complete with scrawny limbs, braces, glasses, and asthma to boot. As he grew older, Hiccup managed to grow out of these few identifying traits (as well as the bullying). His eye-sight grew better, the braces came off, and he bulked up some-what. Even his asthma became less of a problem, to the point of eradicating any need of an inhaler.

Unfortunately, asthma never disappears. Not completely. And it looked like it was coming back at the worst possible time.

Due to Hiccup's already existing lung issues, his body was not able to completely expel all the smoke that had invaded his lungs from the fire. The poison was still festering inside his breathing organs, building and damaging his tissues and muscles. Hiccup wasn't sure what would happen if it was left there, but he was sure it couldn't be good.

He'd often found himself waking in the middle of the night to coughing fits, his body doing its best to get rid of the smoke that refused to leave his lungs. The hacking had grown so bad that it had caused him to vomit at times.

Hiccup looked over at Toothless, the dog having started whining with concern at his master's coughing fit.

"Doesn't seem to be looking to good, does it boy?" he asked as he reached over and gave Toothless a reassuring rub of the head.

* * *

How many day's had it been? He couldn't be sure. How far had he gone? Again, not too sure. He just knew he was somewhere in the middle of Ohio. He'd stopped being able to read the map a day or two ago.

He couldn't take more than two steps before falling into a coughing fit. The burning in his lungs was excruciating. He relied almost entirely on a walking stick he'd picked up to get anywhere.

Their average milage of twenty miles a day dropped to eight. They'd have to stop every few feet for Hiccup to cough or rest his aching and blistering stump.

The days had dragged by, and they had yet to find any medical supplies to help Hiccup. The wounds were becoming infected instead of healing. His lungs were clogging up instead of emptying. He had a fever. It burned him up more than the fire had. He was sweating. It was affecting his brain, as well. His thoughts were scrambled and reality started to mix with fantasy. The skies filled with dragons. All signs they came across pointed towards Washington D.C., whether it was the right direction or not. A woman's laughter filled his ears that strangely familiar. He could've sworn he'd heard Toothless talking to him in English at one point. Nothing made sense. He struggled to see in a straight line, much less walk it. They couldn't risk going into a town to find medicine. Not in his state. It would only be a matter of seconds before they'd stumble on the infected once in a city, and Hiccup was in no condition to run or to fight.

It'd almost been three weeks since they'd left home. Every time they had to stop, Toothless would whine. Paw at Hiccup's legs, lick at his face. Do his best to convince his master to stop. The more they walked, the sicker he grew.

Only Hiccup wouldn't stop. He couldn't. D.C. was his last source of hope. He and Toothless hadn't come across a single living soul since they'd been on the road. Healthy humans might not even exist any more. He might be the only one left. But there was still the chance. That last glimmer of hope that his mother was alive and healthy and waiting for him in D.C. That one last chance that he had family left. Someone who cared about him. So he kept trudging on, eyes trained on D.C.

The two stopped early that night. They came across a small neighborhood, completely abandoned. Not a living person in sight. The second house they came to was empty. No dead bodies, no corpses, walking or otherwise. Hiccup stumbled in through the front door, Toothless loping along side him.

Hiccup fell to his knees under the weight of the bags he was still carrying. He dropped them and left them in the entryway to the house. He was so tired. Exhausted beyond description. Everything was pain. Everything was heat. He was on fire, the fever cooking his thoughts and reasoning until all he had were delusions and hallucinations.

It was Toothless that found the house. He was the one that nosed his way in through the open door and sniffed around to make sure it was clear. He was the one that dragged his master into the house by his pants leg, hauling him along to somewhere the dog could sense was safe.

Hiccup fell onto the couch in the front living room of the house. He was two seconds aways from passing out right then and there, the fever consuming him completely.

And then something caught his eye.

A stereo.

Small, sleek. Probably ran on batteries. An iPod was still hooked up to it. A thought floated into his head. _Wonder if it still works. _Suddenly, his priorities were skewed. The fever had baked his brain, screwing with his survival instincts. Sleeping wasn't what was most important now. That stereo was. He didn't know why. He just had to make sure it still worked.

Hiccup stumbled to his feet, much to Toothless's dismay. Hiccup needed to rest, that was obvious. The lab let out a whine and pulled at his master's pants again with teeth, trying to get him back to the couch. The dog did his best to refrain from barking, knowing the sound could draw any infected people to them.

Hiccup ignored him and continued towards the stand alone stereo system. His legs gave out and he fell to his knees as he made it to the stereo. The table that the stereo rested on was still within reach and Hiccup stretched to hit the on button.

It came to life.

The stereo turned on, it's face lighting up. Looked like it still had working batteries after all. Hiccup fumbled for the iPod, fingers numb as his mind began to fog over. Something nagged at the back of his brain. Something about batteries. How they shouldn't be wasted now that the world had gone to shit and there was no more electricity for things to run on.

And something else. Something about noise. How it was bad. Attracted sick people or something.

Hiccup pushed the thoughts away. He didn't care any more. He hadn't heard music in so long. He used to listen to it all the time. Lock himself in his dorm room and blast Beethoven when his roommate was still at class. Walk around campus, headphones screwed in, blasting Mozart. He just wanted to hear music again.

So, with a few quick touches, Hiccup turned the iPod on. Found the music. Thank gods. It had a classical playlist.

With one last tap, the stereo started blasting. Johann Sebastian Bach's _Overture in the French Style _rang throughout the house, piano keys singing out, spilling out of the windows and resounding through the street.

Hiccup fell to the floor, finally losing the battle as the fever overcame him. Toothless started barking. The music rang out like a beacon. The situation wasn't looking too good at all.


	10. Chapter 9

**Chapter 9: Zombies Aren't Real  
**

The fire crackled and popped. Its light sent shadows jumping and jittering across the walls of the otherwise dark living room as it continued to burn in the working fireplace, eating up dried wood and crumpled paper. Its embers glowed as its noise filled the quiet space and its life warmed the four post-teens collected around it.

Rapunzel watched as the fire danced, her legs pulled up to her chest, arms warped around her knees. Her frying pan was on the floor at her side for easy access if she needed it. Though she was the closest to the fire, but she could still feel a tremor in her fingers. She gripped the hem of her skirt in her fingers a little tighter, hopping to stop the shaking before the others noticed. She didn't think they would. They were too wrapped up in their own conversation, anyways.

It turned out that the three men that had invaded her house were robbers. But not of a traditional sense. They hadn't been meaning to take anything from anyone. They'd found the house, hidden way back in the woods, miles from any real city or major roads, and thought it was empty. They were simply looking for food. Only they were wrong. The house wasn't empty.

* * *

"You the one that took out the zed downstairs?"

"W-What?" Rapunzel asked. Her arms were starting to shake from the strain of holding up the frying pan as her toes curled around the edge of the bathroom counter.

The boy with the warm eyes and brown hair gave a shrug.

"You know, the zed. Dead thing. Blue eyes, baked brain, walks around like this."

The boy stuck out his arms, still holding his metal staff, and shuffled his feet around, his mouth hanging open, eyes rolling. Rapunzel supposed that it was meant to be funny. But honestly, she couldn't see the humor in it whatsoever. The boy dropped the act as soon as he realized Rapunzel wasn't getting it.

"Ahhh." The boy looked at her, slightly bewildered.

_Jack_, she remembered. _His name is Jack._

He ran his fingers through his hair, managing to ruffle his bed head even more.

"You know…the zed," he said again with more insistence, still confused by the fact that he had to explain himself. "Known for its craving of human flesh. Attacked you probably, am I right?"

Rapunzel narrowed her eyes. She still had not a single clue about whatever this guy was talking about. What he said made her nervous, though. (Ok, _more_ nervous.) How could he possibly know that her mother had tried to attack her?

Jack dropped his hand, his shoulders slumping as he stared at Rapunzel, confusion crossing over his face.

"You know…," he said cautiously. "The zombie?"

* * *

Rapunzel's head snapped up at the sound of a question, her memories interrupted like the surface of water when you drop a rock into it, ripples spiraling uncontrollably, water splashing everywhere, the clear, smooth surface replaced by chaos.

"Huh?" she asked, having missed what had been asked.

"I said, 'so how about you, Princess?'"

It was Jack that was talking. The smallest of the three men, with his messy hair and wide smile.

"Bunny's going to the coast to find a boat he can take to get back to the great 'down unda'."

He said the last part with a funny voice that Rapunzel didn't recognize, but she noticed that it earned him a smack to the back of the head by the largest of the three men, who went by Bunny. Jack just laughed it off and continued.

"And Flynn said that there's refugee camps set up in D.C. he's trying to get to, so I figured I'd tag along with him since I had nowhere better to go. So how about you?" he asked again. "You headed anywhere in particular?"

Rapunzel twisted the hem of her skirt in her hands. She refused to bring her head up any higher than necessary to see the others, her mouth and nose hidden behind her knees.

_Was she going anywhere?_

Why would she be going anywhere? She had nowhere _to go_. Why would she leave her home? She didn't understand what he was saying. Refugee camps? Camps for what? Her heart began to pick up speed and she'd been clenching her teeth for so long that her jaw had begun to hurt.

She gave a tiny shake of her head no.

"Well you're welcome to come with us, if you want, love," Bunny spoke up, "Least we could do for letting us stay the night."

"Speak for yourself," the other man, Flynn, grumbled as he rubbed the back of his head, where there was no doubt a growing bump.

Rapunzel's hands started to shake even harder. What had she been thinking? Letting these men stay the night? Letting these ruffians, thugs, _thieves_, stay in her home?

What a stupid question that was. She knew what she'd been thinking. She'd been thinking she didn't want to be alone anymore.

Bunny, though he was the largest of the three, was as far as she could tell, also the kindest. He was the only one that had been able to calm her down in the bathroom. He managed to convince her that the three of them weren't going to hurt her. That they'd thought the house was empty and that they were sorry for frightening her.

They were about to leave before before Rapunzel stopped them. She knew now that she shouldn't have. They were strangers, after all. She didn't know anything about them, and mother had always warned her about all the different kinds of dangerous people that lived in the world. She knew she shouldn't have asked them to stay the night, either. But she couldn't help herself.

The thought of another night on her own terrified her.

But she didn't realize what a terrible idea it had been. Ever since they'd gotten here, the intruders hadn't been making any sense. They talked about things that confused her, things that she knew couldn't be real.

* * *

_ ~Jack dropped his hand, his shoulders slumping as he stared at Rapunzel, confusion crossing over his face._

_ "__You know…," he said cautiously. "The zombie?"~_

* * *

Zombies? Zombies couldn't be real, they just couldn't. They were fiction, fantasy, impossible. She knew. She'd read enough books about them. Zombies didn't exist. Just like vampires and werewolves didn't exist. But these men were talking about them as if they did.

The trembling in her fingers had started to migrate up Rapunzel's arms until her shoulders were shaking. The others still hadn't noticed.

"It's a nice set up you've got here, though," Bunny said as he gestured around the living room. "Secluded, easily defendable. Quite the find. You've even set up some good defenses around your boarder."

"So how long have you been hiding out here?" Jack asked. Rapunzel's eyes snapped to him, the lower half of her face still hidden. What kind of a question was that? "I'm guessing not too long," he continued, "since you don't seem like someone that's come from up North."

Rapunzel could feel her whole body trembling now, just as it had two nights ago after her mother had attacked her. It felt like her heart would burst from her chest if it raced any faster.

* * *

_~"You know…," he said cautiously. "The zombie?"~_

* * *

Zombies weren't real. Zombies weren't real. Zombies didn't exist. These people were crazy. They were nut-jobs, wackos, insane, just like the people Mother warned her about. Zombies weren't real. Why were they talking about zombies if they didn't exist? Zombies weren't real.

_But if zombies aren't real, what happened to your mother?_ A voice popped into her head, scattering her thoughts. _She'd been dead, and then she wasn't. She attacked you for no reason at all. If that wasn't a zombie, then what was it?_

Rapunzel's teeth had begun to chatter, her shaking uncontrollable. If she twisted the hem of her skirt any more, she was sure she'd rip it.

Zombies weren't real. They didn't exist. They were made-up, pretend. Zombies. Were. Not. Real.

_But your mother__…_

"Eight—" Rapunzel choked out, her throat closing up before she could finish. She'd never had a panic attack before. Never had the need to. Mother had always kept her safe, locked away in the house so no one could hurt her. But now her mother was dead. And the outside world was now invading her home, her life, ripping open her jaw and stuffing itself down her throat until she felt like she couldn't breath.

Jack nodded, completely oblivious.

"Eight weeks, not too bad. How often do you make runs for food—?"

"Eighteen—" Rapunzel managed to choke out a little more before her voice was swallowed once more by the thunder that shook her body to the core. Her eyes were going to pop out of her head if they grew any larger. Her teeth were going to shatter if they chattered any louder. Zombies were not real. Zombies were not real.

Jack stopped and looked at her, face blank from surprise.

"Eighteen years," Rapunzel forced out, the words shaking as they tumbled out of her. "I've been hiding out here…for eighteen…years…"

The room had gone stiller than a graveyard. All three men had frozen to stare at her. Even the fire seemed to die down somewhat, its hissing and popping growing quiet. Rapunzel had never had a panic attack before now, but she was pretty sure that this was what one felt like. She felt like she was going to fall apart at the seems if she shook any harder. Zombies were not real. Zombies were not real.

After a few more unbearable moments of silence, Jack spoke.

"Flynn," he said slowly without taking his eyes off Rapunzel, "When you did a sweep of the house, did you find a T.V.?"

Flynn took a moment to respond, no doubt running through his memory for an answer.

"No."

"How about a computer or radio?"

"No. Found a radio out back that looked like it'd been thrown out the window, but that was it."

"Not even a newspaper?"

Flynn shook his head no.

When Jack didn't ask anything else, Flynn spoke up.

"What does that mean?"

"It means," Bunny started, jumping out of his apparent daze and off the couch he'd been sitting on, "that she has no idea what's been going on out there."

Bunny was next to her in a second, kneeling in front of her as he reached out to grip her shoulders. His bright green eyes found hers and tried to get her attention.

Only, she couldn't focus. Her eyes were fixed on something in the distance. Rapunzel's mind was racing to keep up with her heart, which was now out of control. She couldn't think. She couldn't feel. The world was falling around her for the second time that week.

"Love, you need to look at me. Calm down," she could hear Bunny's voice grow distant.

"Z-Z-Zombies a-a-aren't real," she managed before the shaking forced her teeth down on her tongue and the taste of copper filled her mouth.

Bunny let out a sigh as he still tried to get her to focus on him.

"Yeah," he said, "That's what we thought, too."

That was the last thing Rapunzel remembered before everything went black.


	11. Chapter 10

**Warning: (bloody) violence ahead  
**

**Chapter 10: Kristoff**

Cities were a bad idea. Like, really bad. So unbelievably bad, he couldn't even fathom reasons good enough to go venturing into one. Kristoff knew that now. Too bad "now" was a little too late. 'Cause here he was, smack in the middle of Detroit, Michigan, of all places, right on the Canadian/US border.

"Wahaha!" he let out a panicked yelp as he stumbled.

_Notgoodnotgoodreallyrealllynotgood._

He was booking it. Sprinting as fast as he could, right down the middle of a wide, city street, cluttered with empty cars. Thankfully, the cars weren't packed too close together, leaving enough room for him to sprint in the space between the lanes.

The reason for said sprinting was the pack of fifteen or so infected, brain-dead, dead-beats on his tail, chasing him right down the middle of the city. It'd been an accident, really. Just one massive misunderstanding. A misunderstanding that looked like it would cost him his life.

How was he to know that big cities equaled death? How on Earth could he have guessed that, though from a distance it looked totally deserted, Detroit was actually filled to the brim with those dead-beat infected bastards? Who could've possibly told him that the reason the city looked so empty at first was because the dead-beats wandering around it were simply hiding. They were all grouped up together, hiding out together in packs in deserted stores and in sewers and back alleyways. They were waiting. Waiting for some witless wonder to come stumbling upon them so they could take them down and have them as a happy meal.

Unfortunately, Kristoff seemed to be that witless wonder. And now said witless wonder was running for his life down some random street, crowded with cars. Thank heavens he left Sven on the outskirts of town. The massive oaf wouldn't have been able to maneuver between the cars as easily, and that would've been the end for both of them.

The plan had been simple. Get in, find supplies, find Sven, get out. Kristoff wasn't familiar with big cities, however. Being raised on the other side of the Canadian/US border, he'd never had much experience with them. Meaning, he failed to deduce that a large population in such a small space meant that the virus had spread faster, leaving less time for people to get out. So what did that create? Entire cities of dead-beats. And with a population of over seven-hundred-thousand, Detroit had turned into one of the biggest dead-beat cities in North America. Fortunately, cities were known to be complicated, with labyrinths of crisscrossing streets, filled with dead cars. It didn't take Kristoff long to loose the hoard of cannibals on his tail. He managed to shake them by weaving in and out of the maze of abandoned cars, as well as cleaver maneuvering through city streets and back alleyways. In less than twenty minutes, he could slow down to a normal pace again, this time treading slowly through the city's inner workings so as to not accidentally stumble upon another camp-out of mindless zombies.

This also meant that he was now lost. He'd lost track of what turns he'd been taking in his panic to escape the ever encroaching hoard of walking dead behind him. He had no clue which direction he'd left Sven in, and he certainly had no idea how to get out of the city.

Any map he picked up proved more confusing than helpful, especially since a lot of the street signs had gone missing in the massive onslaught of the HSE virus.

Kristoff had been wandering around Detroit for what he guessed was close to five hours (in actuality it was closer to seven), treading cautious now to avoid any more hoards of dead-beats, the careful maneuvering considerably slowing his progress. The sun had hit its high point in the sky and had already started to make its way down towards the horizon. If only Kristoff could remember what direction the sun set in (North, East, West, or South), he could orient himself and find his way back to Sven.

Unfortunately, though he'd managed to find some bottled water and food to keep him going, Kristoff had still been walking who knew how far out in the sun for seven hours, causing his body to heat up to dangerous temperatures and leaving him too exhausted and tired to keep East separate from West.

Kristoff was picking his way through a pile of garbage clogging up a small alleyway, doing his best to keep quiet and under the dead-beats' radar while staying out of the sun as he made his way towards the opposite side of the city he'd left Sven at, when he heard a commotion. It didn't sound like the kind of noises the dead-beats made. The infected usually made shuffling, incoherent noises with their rotting limbs and throats. On occasion, they would even scream this piercing, high-pitched sound that was the most inhuman thing Kristoff had ever heard.

But the noises ahead sounded like voices.

The infected also couldn't talk. At least, not like the living could. Which meant, there were people nearby. People who might have a clue on how to get out of this damned city.

Kristoff decided to pick up his pace, quickly shifting through the alley garbage to the other side before he could loose the sound of living people. Kristoff managed his way down a couple of streets and alleyways, surprised by how far the voices seemed to be. He realized though that he shouldn't have been all that surprised. The city was empty, after all. No cars, no electricity, no people, no construction cites. Everything that would've once made noise was now a distant memory, leaving way for an eerily quiet city that allowed voices to carry three times as far as they'd once done.

As Kristoff neared the voices, he noticed something off about them. It didn't sound like a normal conversation. Not a civilized one, at least. Instead, it sounded like the voices were arguing. He could pick out that one was high pitched, the other angry and low. Concern quickened Kristoff's pace and soon, he came to another alleyway.

At the far end of the alley, he saw a a girl with braided pigtails and a megenta hat run into view. Not long to follow was a man with a long stride and a furious face.

"Get back here, you whore!" His words cut at the girl.

The girl had run into a dead end. She was face to face with a wall with a bus blocking her path to her left and Kristoff's alleyway somewhat obscured by more garbage. She turned to face the man, who was on top of her in seconds, slamming her against the wall, and gripping her wrist hard enough to bruise it. She let out a yelp of pain.

Kristoff's heart leapt as his thoughts caught fire. As the man slapped the girl, it was obvious what was about to happen and Kristoff would be damned if he let it.

"Hey—hmmmf!"

He'd been about to move forward to leap over the low wall of trash at the base of the alleyway when arms wrapped around him from behind, a hand clamping over his mouth. There was a small _zip!_ing noise and he felt a zip tie press into his wrists. He felt as the sharp edge of a blade was pressed against his throat.

A "shhhhhhh" came from behind him.

Kristoff strained as he slid his gaze to peer out the corner of his eyes as his heart pounded in his throat. Whoever was holding him was strong. Not so strong that he couldn't break free if he wanted to, but the knife pressed against his throat cut off any ideas of that happening.

He managed to catch a glimpse of his attacker's face, which was pulled close to his own. It was a girl. She couldn't have been too tall from the way she was restraining him. She had small, brown eyes, a round face and blonde hair shorn so short that it stuck up everywhere.

She slid her gaze to look back at Kristoff, a small smile playing on her lips. She gave a tiny nod of her head towards the girl and the man at the end of the alleyway, as if to say "Just watch."

Kristoff's chest seized, his mind stuttering. _Just watch?!_ How could this girl just let this happen and force him to watch. He felt like he was going to be sick.

The girl jerked his head with the hand she still had firmly clamped over his mouth to turn him back towards the scene at the end of the alley. The redhead was crying as the man hit her again. Kristoff jerked forward as the blonde-haired girl held him back. He couldn't let this happen. He couldn't just sit by and watch.

And then, a battle cry sounded out from above. A shrieking yodel that was somewhere between dead-beat and human.

The man at the end of the alley pulled away form the redhead as he looked up in surprise. That was the wrong move.

Some sort of warrior princess dropped out of nowhere, bringing a massive battle axe with her, held above her head and letting it swing down with the momentum of her fall, like something from an epic roman war movie.

_Slink!_

Kristoff's eyes widened in horror as the man's head fell from his body to roll along the alleyway floor, blood spilling everywhere, the axe having done its job.

Kristoff suddenly felt a pressure on his back pushing him forward. His feet backpedaled. When he'd been fighting to move forward, moments before, now he was trying to stay the hell away from this psycho with the axe. The blonde-haired girl proved insistent and forced him forward, over the wall of trash and out of the alleyway where the girl with the axe was now talking to the girl with the braids.

"Geez, Astrid, took you long enough," the redhead said, brushing off some gravel from her teal shorts.

"Yeah, sorry about that, Anna," the other girl said. She was dirty blonde, with one thick braid, choppy bangs, and a headhband. "Mishap on the roof. Anyways, Sandy was supposed to be back-up—"

With one last push the short-haired blonde shoved Kristoff forward, making him stumble to the his knees in the middle of the two girls.

The redhead let out a gasp as she stepped back.

He looked up to find the blonde one with the braid standing over him, steely blue eyes on fire with blood still splattered across her face, the image of some demon straight from hell.

"Sandy?" she asked Kristoff's attacker as she came around to stand beside the blonde with the braid and the bangs. There was a _woosh!_ and a razor sharp axe was suddenly in Kristoff's face. "Who the fuck is this?"

Kristoff swallowed as he looked at the blade, still slathered in blood and less than an inch from his face. Yup. Cities were definitely a bad idea.

* * *

**A/N: So, yeah, tried to clear up who was who in this end bit a little better. Hopefully, it worked...? (p.s. yes, I genderbent Sandy (the Sandman) but i have reasons, I promise. Mostly, it was really the only place I could fit him in, plus I really needed this role filled, and he was really the only one that could do it, but he needed to be a girl to hang with this gang because of...reasons..._*spoilers*_ don't hate me D:)**


	12. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11: The Stranger and His Dog**

"Boys!" Merida hollered. She banged open the last door of the house, only to find yet another empty bedroom. She let out a grunt of frustration.

"Now is not the tyme!" She was across the room in two seconds and ripped open the closet door to shuffle through a collection of pastel shirts and grey suits. After finding the closet to be absent of any small children, Merida went over the the bed and dropped to the floor it investigate the space underneath.

"Where are ye wee devils hiddin'? Come'on, we have teh go—eep!"

Merida suddenly felt a weight land on her back as two others collided with her sides. In seconds, she was rolling on the floor, wrestling and giggling with her three younger brothers, hopelessly outmatched.

"Merida!"

The laughter tumbled to a stop as the four of them froze. Merida was on her back and tilted her head backwards to look at the figure standing in the doorway.

"Ay?" she asked her mother.

"Boys, it's not play time, go find your father. We're leaving."

The toddler triplets hopped up at once and scurried past their mother, pushing each other and giggling as they went.

As they left, Elinor stepped forward and gave her daughter a hand in getting up form the floor.

"Merida, I told you to find the boys, not play with them."

Merida rolled her eyes.

"_Mum_, we were just havin' a wee bit of fun. Besides they attacked me firs'."

"We don't have time for games, dear," Elinor explained calmly as she stood Merida up and they left the room, "we have to leave while there's still daylight."

"Allrigh' allrigh'," Merida said, slightly irritated by her mother's strictness. "No need teh natter," she finished under her breath.

The two followed the boys to find Fergus by the door of the house, arms full of duffle bags.

"Here ya are, lassie," he grunted as he tossed Merida a bag and then another one. She shouldered both of them and picked up her bow from where she'd left it propped against the couch. Elinor took two bags of her own along with another sword and the boys shouldered their own, mini-backpacks.

The family gathered around the door, Fergus in the lead with a broadsword and the ready, Merida behind him with an arrow strung in her bow, and Elinor cluttered with the boys behind the both of them.

The family grew quiet quickly. Even the boys stopped their playful shoving to look at their dad and sister. Fergus looked back at his family, counted to three, and then very carefully, unlocked and opened the front door. He slipped outside quietly as Merida wedged herself in the doorway before it swung shut. She watched her father trudge out onto the street, keeping both eyes and ears peeled.

After a few moments, he turned back to her, and motioned for them to follow. With a nod from Merida, the five of them filed out of the house and onto the street to join Fergus.

"Yeh did nit see any sickos?" Merida whispered as she was the first to reach her father.

Fergus shook his head no.

Merida cast a glance around, her stomach suddenly becoming queasy. That was strange. Usually, when ever they left a house, there was always at least three or four of the infected wandering about for them to take down. But now, there was nothing. The absence of any sickos set Merida's teeth on edge.

The family quickly made their way down the empty street, keeping their footfalls as light as possible. The house they'd just left was the last one in the street that had been cleared out by them. It was at the end of a cul-de-sac, so the family had to make their way back up to the main street before they found another house to squat in.

When they reached the intersection at the end of the street, however, Merida pulled them all to a stop.

"Do you hear tha'?" Merida asked in a low voice, her head bent as she strained her ears.

"The infected?" Elinor asked quietly.

Merida shook her head.

"No, no. I's….music," she said, surprised at her own realization.

"_Music_?" Fergus asked incredulously. "Lass, tha's not possible—"

"No!" Merida hissed. "Jus' listen."

The family stood in silence for a few seconds more, listening to the wind. Elinor and Fergus both heard the music at the same time, looking up at each other in surprise.

"What does it mean, Fergus?" Elinor asked, concern creeping into her voice for the first time in months.

The large man shook his head in answer.

"Can' have been left runnin', the batteries would've died by now."

"Do you think i's a call for help?" Elinor asked.

"Or a trap?" Merida suggested, her tone not as hopeful as her mother's.

Merida's fingers began to dance on her bow, a nervousness coursing through her body. They had to get out of the open. Sure, there weren't any sicko's around now, but it wouldn't stay like that forever.

Fergus glanced between his wife and his daughter. After a moment's thought, he came to a conclusion.

"Aye'll go see what it is. You lot stay back here in tha' house on the corner."  
"We are not going to be separated!" Elinor hissed, loud enough to make the boys jump.

"Wha' if tha' music's where tha' sicko's are. Maybe tha's why they're no' here," Merida suggested. "Yeh'd be goin' intah a slaughter."

She hated agreeing with her mother, but she couldn't shake this feeling that something was going to happen soon, if they didn't move. A street completely empty of any sickos was a truly eerie picture.

"I's jus' fer a quick look teh see wha' it is," Fergus insisted.

"Aye am not loosing my husband to a stupid stroke of curiosity," Elinor whispered, her eyes furious.

"Fine, fine. Yeh can come along if yeh like, jus' stay behind me," Fergus bargained.

And with that, Merida's father started jogging towards the source of the music, leaving Elinor no choice but to follow. Merida stared after them in disbelief. Had they gone mad? This had to be the worst idea ever. She couldn't very well stay behind on her own, though.

So with a grunt and roll of her eyes, Merida started jogging after her family.

As they continued towards the source of the sound and the music grew louder, Merida gripped her bow more tightly, expecting to see the sicko's that must've been attracted to the music. Only there wasn't any. They didn't come across a single infected person, which only managed to grate against her nerves even more.

_Where are all the bloody sickos?_

They'd made it a few streets before they heard something else under the sound of the music.

Barking.

It was drowned out for the most part by the music, but it was obvious that it was the barking of a dog. Fergus slowed his gate slightly as he cast a glance at his wife and then back at his daughter. The music was incredibly loud by this point, impossible to ignore. And still not a sicko in sight.

When they came to the next street over, a stray dog with shaggy, midnight-black fur, came loping towards them out of nowhere, bringing all six of them to a stop. Fergus aimed his sword at the canine, while Merida trained her bow, waiting for it to attack.

Only it didn't. The dog just stood there, barking at them, as if it was trying to tell them something important. After a minute of the Mexican Stand-off, Fergus cautiously lowered his sword. The dog hopped a little closer, its barking more insistent. The large Scotsman took a step forward, causing the dog to paw nervously at the ground.

"Fergus," Elinor hissed in warning.

"I's a'right," Fergus muttered, distracted as he held a hand out to the creature. "Aye think he's tryin' teh tell us somethin'."

The dog stopped barking, its voice fading out to a whine as its inched its way closer to the large man.

The DunBrochs had had dogs of their own at one point. Hunting dogs that Fergus had running around the house uncontrolled enough to drive Elinor mad. They'd had to let them go at one point to save food for the rest of the family. But Merida remembered how much her father had loved those dogs, how hard it'd been to let them go. Those canines had saved his life on a hunting trip more than once and it had broken his heart to send them away.

The black dog came closer to the Scotsman, sniffing at the outstretched hand. After a few sniffs, it let out a small yip and licked at Fergus's hand before turning and taking a few steps in the direction it had come from. It looked over its shoulder barked at the DunBrochs with a small hop, encouraging them to follow.

Without question, Fergus stood and followed the canine. Elinor and the boys were close to follow as the dog started loping back down the street, barking all the way. Merida tagged along reluctantly. Her heart was pounding and she couldn't shake this strange feeling in her stomach. Something was definitely off. They still had yet to come across a single sicko, some mysterious music was playing during the end of the world, and now her family was being lead by some strange dog to some strange house, only to find lord knew what.

Merida was the last to get to the house, trotting up behind the others. The stray had apparently ran straight through the front door, leaving the family at the open doorway. Elinor, the boys, and Merida stayed behind as Fergus peeked around the edge of the door. He waved at the others to stay back as he cautiously stepped into the house. It was obvious that this was the house the music had been coming from. Some cacophony of pianos and violins was blasting through the open door from some unknown source just on the other side.

Merida's palms had started to sweat as her nerves screamed at her. The fact that this strange dog appeared out of nowhere to bring them directly to the house that the music was coming from, with not a single sicko yet to be found still. It was all becoming more and more unsettling. She just wished they could cut the music leave the dog, and be on their way—

"Elinor!"

Merida's father's yell erupted from inside the house. Elinor was through the door in a second, with Merida quick to follow. The boys crammed their way in through the front door after the both of them.

With a quick glance around, Merida found that the house was clear. No sickos, no humans. Both her gaze and her heart stopped, however when she found what her dah'd had been hollering about, and what both her parents were huddled over at the moment.

It was a boy.

A stranger that looked only a year or two older than herself, with shaggy, brown hair and grungy clothes, passed out underneath a coffee table in the front living room of the house. From what she could see, he was very pale, his cheeks and lips a bright, feverish red as his eyelids fluttered frantically. The stereo that the music had been coming from was still on and blasting from the coffee table the boy was under. The stray that had lead them here was still barking and whining as he licked at the boy's face.

In a few short strides, Merida had crossed the room to the three of them and turned off the stereo, a blissful quiet falling over them.

"Fergus," Elinor started, "Check his eyes. See if it's the virus."

Fergus carefully lifted the boy's head and opened both of his eyelids while Elinor pinched at several places along his arm.

"They're green and clear," Fergus reported.

"Skin's taunt, as well," Elinor said. "It's not the virus, but he's burning up."

She reached forward then to lean over the boy and lightly tap his face. When nothing happened, she tapped a little harder and lifted his eyelids for herself.

"He's responding to light, but he's not waking up," she said, concern edging her voice. "Merida, would you get that bloody dog out of here," she said, swatting at the stray that kept trying to get at the stranger's face, "and keep the boys away."

"Wha', why?" Merida asked, confused.

"Because, we need to help this boy and I can't do it with everyone messing about!"

"Help him?!" Merida asked. "Wha' doya mean help him? Mum, sickos'll be coming tru tha' door any minute. We need teh go!"

"Then close the door!" Elinor retorted. "Merida, this boy needs our help, and I will not leave him to die."

"Well, wha' then after? Is he jus' gonna tag along wit us?" Merida asked sarcastically. "We can't feed him. We can barely feed ourselves."

"We'll figure something out," Elinor replied, her temper growing short. "Just do as I say."

"If we take him wit us, we'll be in danger. He can't fight lyke tha'!" Merida insisted. "Family's firs', tha's wha' Dah'd said. If we take him, we won't be able to protect ourselves! We won't be able to protect the boys! Our food—"

"Merida," her father interrupted. "Do as yer mother says. We are helping this boy."

"But Dah'd, we _can__'__t_ help him," Merida insisted. "If yeh help him now, he won' be healthy enough teh fight. He'll die anyways."

"Then we'll fight for him," her father responded.

"How can we protect ourselves if we're lookin' after a babie lyke him—!"

Elinor was on her daughter in a second, eyes serious, hands clamping down on shoulders.

"Merida, listen to me," she said, her tone so intense, it shocked Merida into silence. "The virus is everywhere. Everyone is dead, do you understand that? _We_ are the only thing that's left of the world. We are what's left of humanity. This boy is sick and he will die without our help. If we don't help him. If we let him _die_, then we have lost our humanity and there will be _nothing _left. Do you understand that, lassie? _Nothing._"

Merida glared back at her mother, the two of them at a stand still, waiting for the other to give in.

With a glance at the boy on the ground, Merida looked back at her mother before giving a grunt and shrugging out of her grip.

"Boys!" she hollered to the three still gathered around the door. "C'mere, and close tha' door!"

Merida grabbed the dog by its collar and dragged it away from the stranger, having to heft her weight against its protests as the boys slammed the door shut and scurried over to join her.

"Go teh the back of the house an' find a room," she told them, still while struggling against the dog's attempts to get back to the boy. "Lock yerselves in thear an' STAY THEAR," she said, emphasizing her words. "If yeh come out, Aye swear, yeh won' have deserts evar again. Got it?"

"Fergus, help me with him," she heard her mother say as the boys scurried off into the house.

Together, the two of them managed to haul the boy up onto the coffee table.

"Hand me your knife."

Without hesitation, Fergus handed his wife the knife he kept in his boot. With one, swift motion, Elinor had ripped the boys shirt off to reveal a bare chest covered in blister and sores.

"Devil's highlands," Merida could hear her mother swear under her breath. Though she couldn't see the blisters herself from struggling with the resistant canine, she could guess that they were bad. She heard more ripping noises and a "bloody hell" from her father. She glanced over her shoulder as saw the that boy had a fake leg from below the knee down, just like her father's. Elinor reached forward and quickly removed the leg to reveal a grotesque mess of blood, black skin, and puss. Merida caught a feint whiff of rotting meat. That couldn't be good.

"Fergus," Elinor said quickly. "Give me the whiskey from your bag."

"The whiskey...?" Fergus asked.

Elinor glanced up at her husband with that looks only wives could give after years of marraige.

"I know you swipped it form the last house, dear, now hand it over. I need to clean his wound."

Fergus gave a worried glance down at the boy.

"But, Elinor, dear," he muttered leaning towards his wife, "the _whiskey_?"

Elinor simply gave him the same look as before and held out her hand.

"Alrigh' alrigh."

A slightly disgruntled Fergus reached around to pull a full bottle of Irish Whiskey from the bag slung across his back and handed it over to his wife. She uncapped it and poured the spirits over the mangled mess of the boy's stump, eliciting a moan of discomfort from the stranger.

"Bloody dog," Merida muttered as the dog suddenly gave a very powerful lunge towards the boy and her fingers threatened to slip from its collar.

"These blisters are filled with puss," Elinor said, looking over the sickly skin. "We need to cut it out and cut off the dead skin," she said as she poured whiskey over her husband's knife to clean it. "Fergus, I need you to hold him down in case he wakes up."

Merida managed to wrestle the dog behind the couch, her parents and the boy on the other side and blocked from view by the couch back as she fell to her rear and brought the dog with her, wrapping her arms and legs around him in a bear hug to keep from getting away.

"Ready, Fergus," she heard her mother ask.

There was a moment of silence before the screaming began.


	13. Chapter 12

**Trigger warning: Mentions of sexual abuse  
**

**Chapter 12: Missing**

"The fuck am I?" Kristoff asked in disbelief at the axe still pointed at his face. "The fuck are you?" he asked as he frantically tried to get to his feet, only to fall on his ass without being able to use his arms still held behind his back with the zip tie. "You-You just chopped someone's head off, like you were from the freaking crusades! You just _killed_ a man in cold blood!" he screamed as he tried to scramble away from the trio on his backside.

"Oh, are you talking about him?" the blonde girl named Astrid asked sarcastically as she swung her axe around to point at the body on the ground. "Well, him?" she adjusted to point towards the decapitated head halfway across the alley. "Because that wasn't like any _man_ I've ever met."

"Astrid," the girl with the auburn braids started. "Let's just leave him. You know, that axe could take someone's eye out if—"

"No, no, no," Astrid started in as she hefted the handle of her axe to rest against her shoulder. "I want to hear what this idiot has to say."

Anna let out a disappointed huff and shot a glance at Kristoff. She gave a tiny shrug as if to say "_Sorry, my friend__'__s kind of a nut job.__"_

His attention was yanked back to the girl with the axe as her shadow suddenly engulfed him.

"So, Idiot, what do you have to say?"

Kristoff looked up at the girl that couldn't weigh more than 115 pounds standing over him and wielding a battle axe as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

"You just killed a human being," he said, narrowing his eyes at her. "What the hell do you want me to say?"

She just smirked, which turned out more intimidating than Kristoff ever thought a smirk could be. In the next second, she was suddenly face-to-face with him, kneeling on the ground of the alley way next to him with the axe still slung over her shoulder.

"Let me ask you something, big guy," she started. "You see what that _human_ was about to do to Anna?"

Kristoff didn't answer. All he could do was glance at the girl with the beanie before looking back to glare at the one right in front of him. She smiled again.

"Alright, now, what would you think if I told you that he and his buddies had already done that to countless girls before her?"

Kristoff blinked.

"It was a trap," he realized. "You guys lead him here to kill him."

"You know, you're not near as dumb as you look," Astrid said with a chuckle.

He couldn't believe what he was hearing. These people had _planned_ a murder.

"You _tricked_ him," he said as his mind started to race. "He wouldn't have hurt you otherwise. You didn't have to kill him—"

"Tell me, blondie, you ever kill a moaner—sorry, a zombie—when it wasn't attacking you or anyone else? When it was just…" she gave a shrug, "minding its own business, not hurting anyone?"

Kristoff didn't answer again. He didn't want to. Astrid could see the answer in his eyes, either way.

"Yeah, that's what I thought," she said, standing to pace around the alleyway. "You probably did it more than once, too, am I right?"

Kristoff continued to glare at her as he struggled to his feet, using the alley wall to support himself. He already knew where the conversation was heading.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of," she continued as she paced back and forward slowly. "Everyone does it. Kills a moaner when they don't have to. Do you know why they do it? It's because they know that that moaner has more than likely killed someone. They _know_ that if they don't kill it, it will undoubtedly kill again. It's the same with scum like him," she nodded towards the body on the ground. "We were simply providing the world a favor through prevention."

"I thought the American policy was 'innocent until proven guilty,'" Kristoff retorted. He remembered learning about something like that in school. "But you killed him before he even had a chance to—"

"To what?" Astrid asked abruptly as she swung her axe down, causing it to connect with the concrete with a clang. "To rape Anna? While I wait for that innocent until proven guilty shit?"

Within two steps and the scraping of metal on concrete, Astrid was in front of Kristoff once again, eyes seething a few inches below his.

"You know that's a great idea, big guy. And then, maybe afterwards, we can all sit around drawing pictures with crayons and talk about how much we love our mommies and daddies and how the world is such a wonderful fucking place. In case you haven't noticed, that world does not exist any more. There are no governments. There is no innocent until proven guilty. There is no judge, jury, executioner. We can't afford that happy horse shit any more. All we can afford is one person to do it all."

"And that one is you?" he asked, refusing to drop eye contact. "Deciding the life of a man?"

"Do you know how many girls this _man_ raped before we caught up to him?" she jabbed her axe at the body again.

Kristoff didn't answer. His chest had gone numb at the question and he wasn't sure if he wanted to hear the answer.

"We found three," she said, her words cutting into him as effectively as her axe. "And that's what we could _find_. Who knows how many others there were. The first one we found abandoned and covered in bruises and blood along the side of the road, just left out for the moaners. We did all we could to help her, but she died the next morning. The second one? He and his buddies killed off her brother and sister she was traveling with and left her the same as they had the first. She was with us for a while before she was taken down by a hoard of moaners about two weeks ago."

There was a moment's hesitation as Astrid stopped, still glaring up at Kristoff.

"And the third one?" he finally asked quietly.

Astrid dropped her gaze and took a step back.

"The third one was Sandy," Anna said softly. "She hasn't spoken since."

Kristoff looked at the short girl with the cropped hair that had restrained him. She stared back at him, her eyes made of stone, almost as if she was daring him to say something.

"Now tell me," Astrid muttered to the ground. "Does that sound like a man, or a monster to you?"

* * *

"Sorry about Astrid," Anna said as she cut through the zip tie with a _snip. _"She gets like that sometimes."

"No, it's alright," Kristoff muttered as he brought his hands around to rub at the red lines on his wrists. "I can get where she's coming from. I'm just glad she didn't take my head off. Literally."

Anna let out a small laugh.

"She's usually fine with strangers, though she's a tad more cautious around men. I think you just surprised her though."

"Yeah, and I'm completely used to having my hands tied while someone's swinging an axe in my face."

Anna gave an apologetic smile. There was a moment's silence before,

"Sandy said you saw what was happening and tried to help me. Even when she had her knife on you."

Kristoff stopped rubbing his wrists and let he hands fall as he turned to face Anna. He gave a small shrug.

"Well, yeah. I couldn't just…let him do that."

Anna smiled.

"Thank you."

Kristoff gave a smile back, realizing as he looked at Anna just how blue her eyes were. And how they sparkled...

"Hey! Tweedle Twat and Tweedle Dick!" Astrid's yell from across the alley interrupted the momentary daze the two had found themselves in. "Anna, we're moving out. Tell blondie over there bye."

Anna cast a glance back at Kristoff.

"Sorry, we have to get going. See ya around," she said with a small wave and a smile as she rose to join the others.

"Yeah…," Kristoff said, slightly distracted. Something was nagging at the back of his brain. Something about needing help with something. "Bye."

Then it hit him. He remembered that he _did_ need help with something.

"Wait!"

The three retreating girls all turned to look at him.

"Is there—ah. Do you think you could—I mean I just need some help getting out of this city. I'm sort of...lost…" he finished lamely, embarrassed at his own incompetency.

"Where are you trying to go?" Astrid asked, brow creased.

"Just to the city limits so I can circle around and try to find my trusty steed. I left him on some off ramp near—"

"Wait," Anna said, stepping in front of Astrid. "Say that again."

Kristoff glanced at her, rather confused.

"I, uh, need to circle around to find my trusty steed…?"

"So like a horse, right?" she asked, her voice a bit too urgent.

"Uh, sort of…"

Anna looked back at Astrid.

"Anna, no—"

"Please," Anna said, spinning around to face Kristoff again. "We need your help. It's my sister, Elsa. She's missing."


	14. Chapter 13

**Chapter 13: Safe House**

Everything ached. It felt like he'd been thrown in the dryer and set to "Express Tumble."

The pain was the only thing he could feel. He was too far gone to comprehend anything past what he could physically experience. Everything was dark. Noises and shadows pressed in at his vision, but none of them made sense. He was incredibly warm, too.

Hiccup was fading in and out of consciousness, still too out of it to realize what was happening around him.

Dreams invaded his restless, fever-induced sleep. Shapes and figures crowded his mind. A bear, large, with red hair that roared and laughed. Could bears laugh? A black dog, running ahead of him, barking like mad. It was Toothless. He tried to call out to him, but the canine didn't answer and kept running until it disappeared. He heard music suddenly. Beethoven, he thought. He turned towards it, only to come face-to-face with a massive crowd of the infected, charging in his direction, away from the music.

Hiccup turned and tried to run, only to find he wasn't moving. He looked down to see that his legs were gone from the waist down. He screamed. He could hear barking again as he turned back around. The infected had caught up to him and swallowed him whole.

Hiccup's eyes sprung open as he took in a sudden gasp of air. He was burning up. It felt like he'd been thrown in a furnace, with nothing but a cold sweat to cool him down.

His breathing was heavy, his heart racing. What was going on? Where the hell was he?

Hiccup realized that he was staring at a ceiling. One he didn't recognize. He could feel that he was surrounded by blankets and resting on some sort of mattress. That was strange. He had a distant memory of passing out beneath a coffee table in an abandoned living room. How the hell did he end up here?

He blinked a few times, trying to clear his vision as he glanced around him. There was very little light in the room. A candle was set burning in the corner as moonlight streamed in through the blinds of the window.

Hiccup felt a flood of relief as he saw Toothless curled up next to him on the bed, sleeping soundly, his furry body rising and falling with every slow breath. He glanced around the rest of the room only to find his heart stopped as his eyes landed on something sitting in the corner.

At first, he though it was some, giant, fuzzy muppet, with crazy red fur. After a second of shock, he found that it wasn't a puppet monster at all.

It was a girl.

She sat curled up on a chair in the corner of the room, surrounded by a cloud of frizzy, red hair. She was stock still, glaring at him with bright blue eyes that shone through the shadows.

Hiccup blinked. She was still there, staring at him from the shadows like some murderous wolf, not uttering a word.

_Okay_, he thought. _So, not an hallucination_.

Hiccup simply stared at her as she continued to glare at him. He wasn't sure what to say. He didn't know if he even should say anything. He didn't know who this girl was, what she was doing there—

She suddenly rose, uncurling her legs and standing up from her chair without saying anything and moved towards the door.

"No, wait," Hiccup called out, suddenly panicked. He wasn't sure why he was suddenly worried that she was leaving, only that he didn't think he wanted to be left alone when he still wasn't entirely sure what his surroundings were.

She ignored him and let the door swing shut behind her with a bang loud enough to wake Toothless. The canine lifted his head and blinked sleepily. Hiccup looked down at his dog. He glanced back up at the now closed door, half expecting the strange girl to come back. The door remained closed. Hiccup turned his attention to the straggle of fur that had just woken next to him.

"Hey, Bud, how's it going?" he asked softly as he reached a hand out to scratch Toothless's neck.

The dog was wide awake in seconds, giving a happy yip as he leaped forward to lick at Hiccup's face while barking merrily. Hiccup laughed as he was assaulted by dog kisses and wrapped his arms around his best friend.

"That worried about me, huh?"

The door of the room suddenly opened again, catching Hiccup's attention.

A figure entered the room, and Hiccup's heart nearly stopped. For a split second, he thought that the figure in the doorway had been his father. Nearly filling the entire doorway, with wild, red hair, a heavy brow and a large nose. After a split second, Hiccup managed to shake the fever from his head and remind himself that that was impossible. His dad was dead.

Hiccup managed to collect his senses and realize that this hulking figure was not his father just before the stranger let out a startling low laugh and pushed his way into the room.

"Well looky here. The lad's up an' adem!"

Hiccup had to force himself once more to remember his father was dead. The stranger's accent was eerily familiar. Strong, deep, and distinctly Scottish, just as his father's had been.

The large stranger was next to Hiccup's bed in second, letting out another laugh as he gave the boy a pat on the back that was rough enough to send him a few inches forward.

"Though we were goin' loose ya thear, laddie."

"Ah, I'm sorry, wh-who are—" Hiccup, bewildered beyond belief and desperate for any answers that could tell him where he was andexactly just what he was doing there.

"Agh, Fergus, just look at you. You're scaring the boy."

Another, unfamiliar voice came from the doorway. Hiccup turned to find a tall, elegant woman with greying hair standing in the doorway. Behind her, Hiccup could see the girl from before, glaring at him from the shadows of the hallway outside. The woman stepped forward to place a gentle hand on the large man's arm, leaving the girl to sulk in the doorway.

"Ah, Elinor dear, Aye was just—"

"I know what you were 'just,' but let the boy have some space," the woman said kindly. She turned to face Hiccup then, with warm eyes and a kind smile.

"Not to worry, laddie. You're safe now."

"H-How did you find me?" Hiccup asked, his confusion unhindered. "What happened? Where are we? I don't—"

"We found you unconscious in an abandoned house down the street—"

"Ay, just like me on none too few a good night out," the larger man named Fergus said with a chuckle, earning him a slap to the shoulder from the woman before she continued.

"You were sick and badly hurt. We patched you up as best we could and brought you along with us. We were nit too sure if you were going to make it to be honest—"

Before Hiccup could even comprehend what he was being told, there was the sound of running feet and the next thing he knew, he was surrounded by giggling, red hair, and tiny feet, jumping and climbing all over him and the bed.

"Boys!"

In the next second, the giggling and feet had disappeared, leaving Hiccup in a slight state of dizziness. As soon as he could see straight again, he looked to find three giggling, ginger triplets hiding behind the woman named Elinor.

"You mustn't mind the boys. They're usually much more behaved," she mentioned with a stern look at the three toddlers, who only giggled and gave each other high-fives.

"No, it's alright," Hiccup said with a shake of his head, his voice faint as his mind was elsewhere. "Wait, so you…saved me?"

"Just nearly," Fergus said with another chuckle. "Don't think we would'a found ya had it no' been fer this mutt," he said with a gesture towards Toothless.

Hiccup looked down at the dog in his lap, who looked back up at him, panting happily. Hiccup smiled back as he ran a hand over Toothless's head.

"I-I don't know what to say," he said, turning to look at the gaggle of strangers in front of him. "Except thank you. And Toothless and I can be on our way in—"

"Ah, no dear. Don't you think about it," Elinor ordered. "Just you wait until you're fully healed and then we can talk about what comes next."

"And remember," she added before Hiccup could object. She leaned forward and gave his shoulder a gentle squeeze. "You're safe here."

Over the next few days, Hiccup fell in and out of consciousness as he continued to battle a fever that proved relentless. When he was a awake, he managed to learn a bit more about the family that had saved him, the DunBrochs. The man as large as a bear and the woman elegant as a queen were actuality man and wife. It'd been Elinor and Fergus that had been the ones to save him and the ones to make the decision to care for and protect him. The children Hiccup had seen before were their children.

The triplets, Harris, Hubert, and Hamish, as it turned out, weren't toddlers at all, but merely small for their age of five years old. And though they rarely spoke, they somehow managed to plan elaborate pranks and adventures between themselves that always managed to off without a hitch. They were "wee devils" as the family called them, but Hiccup couldn't help but admire their ingenuity.

The eldest of the DunBroch children was the girl Hiccup had first woken to sulking in his room. Her name was Merida, but she wasn't the one to tell him that. In fact, she'd barely spoken to him at all since he'd first woken up. She'd come by every now and then to give him medicine and food, uttering barely more than a few, curt words. As far as he could tell, he wasn't the only one to be getting the cold shoulder. She seemed to get along with her father and brothers just fine, but tended to have a short fuse with the woman of the family, Elinor. Hiccup just couldn't figure out what her problem was. With him or her mother. He could tell he was a year or two younger than him, but he wasn't one to chalk moodiness up to teenage hormones. There was definitely something else in the mix.

The DunBrochs helped Hiccup as best they could, leaving him to his peaceful rest as he continued to heal. They shared their food with him and checked up on him regularly. They even left the door to his room open when he was awake, so he wouldn't feel so isolated from the rest of the house.

It'd been strange for Hiccup, to see a real family in action. Sure, he was asleep for most of the time, and when he was awake, he wasn't the most coherent. But what he did see was something rather alien to him. His family had never been much. His mother gone, it had always just been him, Toothless, and his father. Not exactly what you'd call a real family. Especially since the last few years had been hardly more than a collection of tense conversations and more fights than he could care to count. Seeing the DunBrochs, the way they worked together, the way they knew each other, the way they loved each other. It made Hiccup feel slightly strange. Not a bad strange. No, not even close. But a warm sort of strange. Seeing a family as complete as this and being invited into their folds, even if was only going to be for a short while. It gave him a sense of security. A feeling of trustworthiness and a certain faith that the world wasn't completely lost. The DunBrochs made him feel safe.

* * *

**A/N: Sorry for the boring chapter, I'm still trying to get my ducks all in order and introduced before I get moving with an actual story line -.-**


	15. Chapter 14

**Chapter 14: Sven**

Kristoff narrowed his eyes. He glanced at Astrid and Sandy before looking back to Anna.

"Why would you need my help?" he asked cautiously.

"You have a horse," Anna said rather bluntly. "A horse can move a lot faster than any of us can. It can walk on the sidewalks and can cover a lot more ground a lost faster. It'll make finding her easier."

Kristoff glanced as Astrid again, only to find an unreadable expression.

"How long's she been missing?"

"Three days."

Kristoff's gaze shot back to Anna.

"She's dead," he said without even thinking. It wasn't like he had to. Three days on your own in a city crawling with dead-beats, there was only one outcome.

Anna shook her head. When she spoke, it was with a certainty that even Kristoff found difficult to disbelieve.

"No she's not. I _know_ she's alive and we have to find her."

"How'd she go missing then?" Kristoff asked.

"She up and left us," Astrid butted in before Anna could say anything. "She packed up and ran off while we were sleeping."

"But she didn't realize what she was doing," Anna countered. "Please if we could just find her—"

"Oh-ho, ho, no," Kristoff said, raising his hands as he shook his head. He'd heard enough. Enough to know that this was something he did _not_ want to be getting involved with.

"If you think I'm going to help a merry band of murderous menstruaters find the fourth member to their—"

"But Elsa hasn't killed anyone—well," Anna quickly amended, "anyone alive."

"Doesn't matter," Kristoff said, throwing his hands in the air. "You guys just killed a man, and that's not something I can easily forget."

"We've been over this," Astrid muttered in not too quiet undertones. "He wasn't a man."

"Man, monster, whatever," Kristoff said as he turned around to leave. "I can't help you."

He'd had enough of this circus show for one day. He began making his way towards the alleyway he'd come from and away from these crazies as fast as possible.

"We'll help you out of the city."

Kristoff froze. _Damn it._ He'd forgotten that he was still clueless as to how the hell to get out of the city and back to Sven.

"We know the city," Anna continued. "We can get you out, but only if you help us find my sister."

Kristoff refused to turn around. His mind bounced back and forth. If he didn't help, he was surely going to die wandering around this labyrinth of a city. If he did help, these crazy lunatics would probably just kill him in his sleep anyways. At least then, he might have a chance at seeing Sven before he died. Plus, he couldn't be completely sure they'd kill him. Unlike the certainty that he most definitely would die if he was left on his own to find his way back to Sven.

Kristoff sighed. It didn't really look like there was much of a choice for him.

* * *

Three hours.

That's how long they went before running into a group of hungry, drooling, rotting dead-beats. Three, stinking short hours.

"WHY DO YOU _NOT_ HAVE A WEAPON?!" Astrid screamed as she sent her axe flying through the air to land in the skull of one of the dead-beats with a wet thump.

"I left it with Sven," Kristoff hollered as he ducked out of the way of a charging zombie, its hands out and grasping for him and just missing. "I didn't think I'd need it! The city looked empty!"

There were about eight of them in all. Eight dead-beats. There had been more at first, but the girls had cut that number down considerably in the last ten minutes alone.

The group had made their way out of city and had been traveling along the out limits, which, as it turns out, they'd been a lot closer to than Kristoff had thought. They had been following the boarder with the city on their right and the woods on their left, when a horde of dead-beats suddenly emerged from the dense collection of trees, right on top of them. They'd barely had time to register what was going on, much less make a run for it.

Kristoff couldn't help but be grateful for Astrid's instincts, otherwise, they'd all be zombie happy meals by now. She'd been to one to smell them, right before they came charging at the four of them from out of nowhere, and the first to attack.

It'd been terrifying. One minute, there they were, walking along, making tense conversation, Kristoff still sore about being black-mailed into helping these lunatics. The next thing he knew, all he could see was chomping jaws and all he could hear was the inhuman screeches of the charging beat-beats that just about shredded his eardrums. True, the dead-beats could only shuffle, but damn, it was a fast shuffle. And for being dead, it was one hell of a surprise at how incredibly strong they could be. Once a dead-beat had it's grip on you, the only way of escaping to freedom was to take the whole dead-beat arm with you, which was entirely possible considering their rotting joints. They came at the four travelers, fast and strong, all rotting flesh with open wounds, rolling eyes, and biting teeth.

"Wow," Astrid said, somehow managing the effort to use sarcasm as she took on the next dead-beat with the knife she'd had strapped to her thigh. "You actually are as stupid as you look."

"Christopher!" he heard a scream. He spun around, just in time to see a lute connect solidly with the head of a dead-beat that had been less than two steps from taking a bite out of him. Despite the situation, Kristoff took the few seconds to appreciate that the guitar-like instrument was a lot sturdier than it looked.

"It's Kristoff!" he shouted as barreled passed Anna and her medieval instrument to tackle the dead-beat that had been coming at her from the right.

"Really?" Anna hollered as she took out another dead-beat while Kristoff struggled with his own on the ground. "Are you sure?"

"Yeah," he yelled back as he wrestled with the infected human clawing at his face while. "Pretty sure." _God, this had been a bad idea_, he realized as he did his best to hold the screaming dead-beat down.

In the next second, he was hoisted up and thrown to the side. The next thing Kristoff saw was the Sandy girl lunge at the dead-beat Kristoff had been handling. She attacked, butterfly knives spinning with nothing but her shorts and big, puffy gold jacket as protection. With a few flicks of her wrist, the zombie's hands were gone, leaving it defenseless as she jammed a blade deep into it's eye socket. The effect was instant as the zombie froze and went limp.

Silence fell as the last dead-beat fell still, everyone left breathless and covered with blood and sweat.

A few more flicks, and the knives spun closed as she stuck them in her back pocket and rose to stand over the lifeless corpse, her chest heaving. She walked over and held a hand out to Kristoff, scowling slightly. He glanced behind her at the dead-beat that had come _this_ close to ripping his throat out.

"Thanks…for that," he said, a little breathless as he realized he'd almost died. "Nice jacket by the way," he added as he looked back up and grabbed her offered hand. Her face softened and she let out a silent laugh as she hauled him up. She gave him a single pat on the back before leaving him to check on Anna. Kristoff didn't follow. He could tell from a glance, the others were alright. Instead, he started walking around and gathering up the luggage the others had dropped in the sudden attack.

He dropped the bags with a _wump!_ next to Astrid as she planted her foot against the shoulder of a dead-beat and proceeded to try to yank her axe out of its head. She glared at him quickly before focussing back on the zombie head with her axe trapped in it, not uttering a word. Looked like she was still sour about their exchange from before.

Kristoff swallowed.

"Ah, thanks."

She cast another glare at him.

"For what?" she said with another yank on her axe.

"For, uh, protecting me," he said, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck. "You guys could've left me for the dead-beats."

She let out a grunt as she gave another tug on her axe, not giving any sign she'd heard him.

"Here, let me," he said stepping forward. Astrid gave him one last glare, before stepping aside to let him wrap his hands around the handle. With one, strong yank, it came free.

"Ah," he said hesitantly holding the axe out from him as it dripped with blood and brains. He held it out to Astrid.

"Sorry about before," he said. "I just…I was scared was all."

She shot another glare at him, though it wasn't quite as hard as the other looks she'd been giving him since that scene in the alleyway. She reached out a grabbed her axe. She squatted to start wiping it off on the grass.

"Yeah, well," she said without looking up. "I might have been a little…rude," she said, her voice a little raw. Almost as if wasn't used to giving apologies. She stood up with her slightly less bloody axe and wiped her hands on the brown shirt tied around her waist. She let out a sigh as she cast a a thoughtful look at the woods.

"We need to be more careful," she said. "They sometimes like to hide in the woods. Creates a good cover for when they hunt."

"What, the dead-beats?" Kristoff asked.

Astrid cracked a smile.

"Is that what you call them?"

He gave a shrug.

"It was Sven's idea."

She contemplated him for a second before giving a slow nod and turned back to look at the woods.

"I like it," she said. "Lot better than what we've been calling them. 'Moaners' isn't exactly unique."

"Yeah," Kristoff said with a chuckle. "Kinda reminds me of my ex-girlfriend. She was what you'd call a moaner."

Astrid laughed. It was sort of weird, to be honest. Kristoff would've never pegged her for the laughing type. More like the scowl and chop your head of type. Still, he appreciated the tenseness that seemed to have disappeared between them.

"Yeah," she said lightly as she picked up one of the bags at Kristoff's feet and turned to go meet the other two, her smile wide. "So was mine."

* * *

"What. The hell. Is that?"

"Sven, buddy!"

Kristoff dropped the bag he'd been carrying as he left the others behind to run ahead.

They'd made it. It was six hours and a mob of bloodthirsty zombies later, but they made it. Following along the outside of the city, they managed to find the off ramp Kristoff had left his "trusty steed", supplies, and afore mentioned weapon of an ice pick axe. The group only had another hour or so of daylight, but they'd made it. Kristoff had made it back to his best friend and Anna had made it to her best chance of finding her sister.

"Okay, I could pick up you're Canadian," Astrid said, following Kristoff cautiously, "but you've _got_ to be kidding me."

"Sven," Kristoff said, speaking to the large, furry creature he'd ran ahead to meet. "These are friends," he gestured towards the approaching girls.

"A moose?" Anna asked in disbelief as the three of them neared the giant, antlered creature Kristoff was hugging and scratching the neck of. The large creature let out a grunt as it reared away from the four of them. "I thought you said you had a horse."

"I never said he was a horse. And look," Kristoff said as he stepped around to face his furry friend. "You hurt his feelings."

"_I_ hurt his feelings?" Anna asked.

"Well how'd you like it if i called you a moose?" Kristoff asked as he turned back to the the large mammal and proceeded to mutter things to it as if he were talking to a baby.

"But that's what he is!" Anna countered.

Sandy set down her bag and carefully approached Kristoff's "trusty stead."

"Not even close," Kristoff said. "He's a reindeer."

He stepped back as Sandy took a careful step forward and held her hand out to the reindeer.

"So, he's an elk?" Anna asked.

"They're the same thing," Astrid said with a roll of her eyes.

The reindeer named Sven sniffed at the small girl's hand held out to him before giving a happy snort and jumping forward to lick Sandy's face. She let one of her silent laughs as she wrapped her arms around his giant neck. Anna and Astrid kept their distance.

"No, he's a reindeer," Kristoff emphasized as he reached up to scratch Sven's shaggy head. "And," he added, "he's family."

Astrid and Anna gave each other a look as Sandy enjoyed the reindeer kisses from her new friend. Anna's was a cry for help, while Astrid's was simply one that said, _It was your idea._

"He's a lot better than you people, anyways," Kristoff muttered as he ignored them and wrapped his arms around the reindeer he had thought he'd never see again.

* * *

**A/N: AAAAAAYYYY, an actual zombie fight scene, with actual zombies, you know, cause it's the zombie apocalypse, and you only had to wait thirteen…chapters…yeah…(Sorry) Also, in case you haven't noticed, I am a strong advocate of diverse and creative weapons being used in a zombie ****apocalypse****. X3 P.S. anyone got ideas for Elsa's weapon of choice? D: I'm thinking sai's or a really big kitchen knife? but I'm not sure -.-**


	16. Chapter 15

**Chapter 15: The Virus**

Rapunzel sat in the shower as the water ran over her, rivulets running down her back and down the tiles walls. Showers sounded different when you were sitting instead of standing. The echoes grew louder, the water would land in your face, everything would reverberate inside your skull. She let out a sigh and leaned to rest her head against the shower wall and watch as the water swirled down the drain and listened to the water droplets as they rained down on her, washing off all the sweat, blood, and stink of the last few days. Funny. The last few days, she'd been living in the bathroom and had not once taken a shower.

She often pretended that she was in a rainforest while taking a shower, the rain pouring down on her as she wandered through the humid trees, listening to the echoes of noises created by the animals. All she had to do was close her eyes, and she was there, in a completely different world. That was one of the reasons she liked showers so much. It was a place to escape. A place where she could pretend that she was anywhere but home. Showers weren't the only things, either. Oh, no. There were books. Books upon books upon books. Each story containing an entirely new world to escape to and explore. There was her art. Every wall of the house was covered in her brushstrokes, creating a wallpaper of collages and murals and paintings, each one depicting a world of her own creation. A world she could escape to.

It wasn't that she hated her home. No, she lover he mother more than anything else. It was just, when all you've seen your entire life were the same four walls over and over, you start to dream of someplace else. Anyplace else. Anywhere that wasn't her house. Anywhere that didn't have her mother or her rules. Anywhere that would allow her to leave the house on her own, or let her go running through the woods, or let her see and meet other people. Anywhere that wasn't…here.

But as Rapunzel closed her eyes and listened to the shower as its water rained down on her, she didn't see a rain forest. She saw a corpse lunging at her with dead blue eyes, a snarling mouth, her mother's hair, and the smell of rot. She saw the ragged fingernails that clawed at her as a terrible screech filled her ears. She saw the frying pan clutched in her own hand fingers.

Rapunzel opened her eyes, only instead of water, all she saw was blood. Blood running in rivulets and raining down. A deep, dark red. Rivers of blood running down the walls of the shower. Blood that spread across the tiles in a spiderweb to fill the cracks and spaces as her mother's body lay dead on kitchen floor, her skull leaking crimson.

Rapunzel reached forward and turned off the water, leaving her drenched and naked and vulnerable in the middle of the shower. Her mother had always protected her. Always kept her safe and the dangers away.

Her mother was dead now. Twice dead, actually.

Who was going to protect her now?

Rapunzel came down the stairs ten minutes later, dried and dressed as her long, blonde hair hung in tendrils down her back. Before her shower, Rapunzel had gone outside to start up the small generator her mother had gotten ages ago for "just in case." It was why the lights were on and how she was able to have hot water for her shower. The power for the house had gone out weeks ago. Rapunzel hadn't used the generator before now because Mother had wanted to save energy for when they really needed it. She wasn't really sure if she needed it, but the sun had set hours ago, and the fire had died, but after Rapunzel's little spazz out downstairs, she realized, she still had things to discuss with these strangers in her home. And having electricity might just make things run a but smoother.

Rapunzel came to the landing to find the others in the kitchen, all awake, all nervous.

Bunny was standing by the table, foot tapping at a mile a minute as he chewed his nails. Jack was crouching on a kitchen chair, leaning on his metal staff, while Flynn had his elbows on the table, his head bowed as he ran hid hands through his hair.

They all turned to look at her expectantly when she entered. She didn't say a word. Instead she calmly moved to sit down at the kitchen table with the others and folded her hands in front of her.

"So," Rapunzel started, "Zombies, huh?"

* * *

"They're not zombies."

"What?" Kristoff asked, confused by the interruption.

After finding Sven, the group had set up camp. They'd pitched tents, distributed food and had started a fire, right there on the interstate off-ramp on the edge of the city. They huddled around the fire with their cans and boxes of food, Sven included as he happily ate from a large can of carrots, the reindeer laying down as Krsitoff sat propped us against his friend's side Anna to his right, with Sandy on his left, and Astrid across from him. They tried to make conversation where they could, Sandy even contributing with hand gestures and pictures drawn with a burnt piece of wood on the concrete.

The topic eventually fell to zombies, Kristoff having let the z-word drop in front of Astrid.

"Don't call them that," Astrid said with a sigh. "They're not zombies."

* * *

"How would you know?" Merida asked, not at all pleased with the interruption of the stranger bundled up on the couch. She and her parents had been at the kitchen table, explaining the sickos to the boys, trying to help them get a better understanding of what they were and how they could be killed. Up until now, they'd thought the boy, Hiccup, had been sleeping, so his sudden input was somewhat surprising.

The boy had been spending more time awake lately, so Merida's parents had decided to move then to the couch in the front living room, so he could be more involved with the rest of the house hold. Merida had put up with it, if only because it was a good sign that he was healing and gaining his strength back that. And that meant, the faster he healed the faster he and that bloody dog of he could leave her and her family bee and they wouldn't have to worry about him any longer. That also, meant, however, that the more he was awake, the more she had to listen to him _talk_. And that certainly something she was prepared to accept.

Hiccup let out a grunt as he sat himself up on the couch to get a better look into the kitchen. Everything still ached and he tried not to jostle around too much.

"Before the virus hit, I was working on getting my MD to become a doctor. As part of the program, I had to intern at a medical company called Black Industries. It was one of the first institutions that were researching the virus when the first few cases of it were being reported. I managed to get a look at it and hear some things from the researchers and doctors before they got rid of all the extra staff and told me I had to go home to keep the chances of someone tracking the virus into the research facility down to a minimum."

"How old are ye, lad?" Fergus asked, curiosity crossing his face.

"Twenty-one," Hiccup answered. "I graduated high school two years early and earned my bachelor's degree in biology in three years. I was in my second year of med school when the virus hit."

"Bloody hell," Fergus muttered as Elinor let out a "Goodness gracious."

Merida rolled her eyes. She'd barely been passing her high school classes when school was still in session. She didn't need to hear about this stranger being a "perfect example" from her parents.

"Well, it they're not zombie than what are they?" Merida asked, exasperated.

"They're sick," the boy explained. "I mean, they're people and all, but they're just very sick."

* * *

"What do you mean they're people?" Rapunzel asked, confused. She remembered the image of her mother charging at her, eyes wild. She'd looked more animal than human.

"Well, according to the reports," Bunny started, "the people that had caught the virus never actually died. They just went in to a coma."

* * *

"Wait, wait, wait," Kristoff said, holding his hands up. "You're saying these things…are alive? As in they're still people?"

"Do they look like people to you?" Astird asked, a little fed up with his apparent stupidity.

* * *

"Well," Hiccup started. "Technically they are people, but not in the way you or I are. It's like rabies. The virus attacks the brain directly. The body may be living, but the brain is destroyed. The person that used to be there is now gone. They're not even really human anymore. They're just these…zombie things."

* * *

"So if these…non-zombies are still alive," Rapunzel started, "why do they look so…"

"Dead?" Jack supplied.

Rapunzel nodded. "They act and look and smell like living corpses, right? But they're not."

* * *

"My guess is that there's some some leprosy mixed in with all that mad cow disease," Astrid claimed, nonchalantly. "The virus eats away at you. Literally. It eats and eats away at you until flesh peels away from bone and you actually start losing body parts and your muscles loose their shape. That's probably how these things still walk and breath after months of not eating. They're running off of their own body being eaten away by the virus. But the virus never devours its host completely."

"Why not?" Kristoff asked.

"Well, that'd defeat the purpose, wouldn't it?" Astrid asked. "The purpose of survival. The virus couldn't survive if it's host was dead. So it eats at your flesh and gnaws at your bone, but it never kills you. Not completely."

* * *

"So all you're left with is this shambling, walking, rotting corpse that's almost impossible to kill because it's not really dead, but it's not really alive either," Hiccup explained.

* * *

"So how do you kill them, then?" Rapunzel asked, trying to keep up. "A shot to the head, right?"

That's what all the books she'd read had said.

* * *

Astrid shook her head.

"You don't know much, do you?"

Before Kristoff could become properly offended, Astrid started talking again.

"Yes, any damage to the brain will kill them, but a direct hit to the heart will do it, too."

"I don't get it," Kristoff started. "Why the heart?"

Astrid shrugged.

"Like I said, these things aren't dead. They still have their most essential organs. Which are the heart and the brain. Take out either of those, the rest will follow."

* * *

"How does tha' work?" Fergus asked. "How come the rest of em's dead bu' the heart and brain are still alive?"

"It's something to do with the virus," Hiccup explained. "It's what it does. It reroutes all the body's energy to the two most essential organs, turning all the others basically useless. As far as I know, no one at the research lad was able to figure out how it's able to do that. Most theorized the reason the virus shut down all the other organs, was to keep the host more resilient. When you've only got two pinpoints that can kill you, there's a better chance of you surviving, and therefore, a better chance of the virus surviving, as well."

* * *

"So head shots and direct hits to the hearts," Rapunzel recapped, making a mental note.

"Yeah, but only go for the heart when you have to," Flynn added.

"Why?"

"Because," Bunny started. "your brain is about the size of two fists placed side by side." He held out his fists to demonstrate. "The heart, however, is only the size of one." He took away one of his fists, leaving only one, suspended over the table. "The brain's a larger, easier target, and you're much more likely to hit it of you're doing anything long range. Up close, it's easier to crack the skull open than to get through the ribcage, chest muscles, and lungs to get to the heart."

* * *

"Wait," Kristoff started, thinking back to the city and what Astrid had said earlier after the zombie attack. "These things aren't really mindless are they?"

Astrid raised an eyebrow at the question.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, in the city, they weren't just wandering around. They were grouped together. In packs. And then you said earlier. They hunted. As in going out and actively looking for food. If something's brain dead, it wouldn't really have the cognitive ability to do those things."

Astrid smirked.

"You catch on fast, blondie."

* * *

"That has to do with the coma stage of the virus," Hiccup explained. "At least, I think it does.

"The infected still have functioning parts and functioning brains. It was just…not all of it is actually functioning. The coma is the one stage of the virus were the fever spikes, and then dies out completely, giving an impression of a cold corpse. If the fever isn't what fries the brain, then it's the lack of oxygen from the coma stage that does. Whatever it is, it destroys most of the brain's higher levels of function and all that's left is raw, primal instinct. Eat. Sleep. Survive. And eat."

* * *

"So why eat humans?" Rapunzel asked.

"Because we're the easiest," Jack said with a shrug.

"The easiest?" Rapunzel asked. She remembered books about the animal kingdom. Pages of diagrams of food chains with humans at the top. How could the top predator sink so low, so fast? It just didn't make sense.

"Yeah, it's sort of pathetic," Flynn said. She was rather sure he'd meant it as a joke, but he wasn't laughing or smiling.

"The easiest source of food available were those that were left uninfected," he continued, his tone dark as he stared at a blank spot on the kitchen table top. "No pesky packaging to get in the way or complicated pantry doors to slow you down. Just some prime, human meat, straight from the bone. That was why they attacked other humans. With our slow bodies and minimal survival skills, we were the easiest targets. You ever try catching a rabbit or deer that's on the run? Most difficult thing in the world, especially if you barely have the muscles to run anymore. Nah, humans are a much easier catch."

"Why don't they eat each other then?" Rapunzel asked.

"Well, who'd want to eat rotting meat?" Bunny asked with a half-hearted chuckle.

* * *

"But all of that is beside the point," Astrid said, waving her fork in the air as if to wave away the topic. "The point being that the infected still have brain function and still operate on survival instincts. That means, they aren't just shambling, brainless monsters left to wander aimlessly around cities. Oh, no. The bastards decide to huddle together. To form groups and tribes and colonies. Because that's survival instinct. To crowd together, work as a pack.

"And _that_," she said as she tossed her empty can of corn at Kristoff, nailing him in the head. "Is why you are such an idiot for going into a city unarmed."

* * *

"It's also why loud sounds and noises attract them," Hiccup continued. "They're working on primal instinct. So, they rely on their sense to lead them to the kill. Sight, smell, taste, touch, and sound. They can sniff us out, which is how they can separate us from the infected. We smell different. Sound carries further than smell, though. So when they hear something that's different or loud, they follow it on the assumption that food will be there. Basic instinct for finding food."

* * *

Rapunzel sat in silence at the kitchen table, taking it in. She knew what these zombies were now. Knew how they were made and knew how to take them down. There was something else, though. Something she was curious about.

"Where did it all start?"

"New England," Jack started, his face unreadable. He looked up at Rapunzel. "Where I'm from."

"They never found a patient zero," Flynn explained. "But everyone's fairly sure it started somewhere up near Main or Vermont. After that, it all just went down hill."

"The thing is, Love, it's not like anything anyone expected," Bunny said. "It wasn't one big event, _Wam_, everyone's dead. It took months for us to end up where we are. Even longer for the rest of the world to realize what was even happening."

"By the time anyone even realized what it was, the virus had spread across several states," Jack continued. "People only even noticed it was happening when the new reports started coming out about dead people coming back to life. A bite's infectious, but the virus is mostly air-born. It spread and it spread fast. Faster than anything the scientists had ever seen. In three months since the first outbreak, it had spread to the West Coast and everyone knew what it was and what it was doing to anyone that caught it. The thing was, by that point, it was too late," Jack's voice trailed off as his gaze fell to the table again, his eyes distant.

After a moment, Flynn picked up.

"The thing is, Blondie, no one had a cure. Sure, we knew what this thing was doing, but no one had a clue as to what it was exactly or how to fight it. People started going crazy. Trying to get the hell out before they caught the bug. They fled the country."

"The problem with that," Bunny said, "was that some were already infected. They brought the virus with them overseas and then it was everywhere. All over the world, spreading like wild fire."

"Riots started in the streets," Flynn continued. "People were scared, and when a lot of people get scarred, a lot of bad things happen. Riots, fires, shootings, lootings. It was madness. The government sent in military to the cities to try and fight the infected. The thing was, before coma stage of the virus, the infected look like everyone else. So while the soldiers were shooting at the zombies, they were protecting people who were going to become zombies on their side of the trench soon enough anyways.

"When they realized that is when the air strikes started. They dropped bombs on cities, civilian cities. They were trying to kill it. Kill the virus before it infected anyone else. But it was already everywhere. Countries shut down their boarders, not letting anyone in. Only it'd already crossed their boarders. Everyone was in a panic. Soldiers were in the streets shooting civilians, infected and not. Schools had already been shut down for months at this point. Then it was the hospitals, because they couldn't really help anyone, anyways. Then the fire and the police stations. The government. The news stations.

"In less than five months, the virus had infected the entire country. In seven, the world. In nine months, there was nothing. It went from full blown chaos to nothing. No one. Those that had been immune to the air-born strain were bitten and infected anyways, eaten, or killed by other survivors. There's only very few of us left."

Flynn finished, letting a silence fall over all of them.

It made sense now. Rapunzel's mother had always been strict about letting her leave the house, but the last year had been especially strict, until finally, she was practically under house arrest. Now she knew it was because her mother was trying to protect her from what was happening. Trying to protect her from finding out what had been going on the whole time. But then she caught it. Caught the virus, and Rapunzel had found out anyways.

She'd found out on her own and was now left with this giant revelation sitting right there at her kitchen table. Rapunzel broke the silence with a soft voice.

"So I guess it really is the end of the world, isn't it?"

* * *

**A/N: Eh, tried something new with this chapter. I wanted to make all the details about the virus clear for you guys, but I thought this would be a cool way for all the characters to be together without really being together. Not sure if it worked too well, but…How'd it go? **


	17. Chapter 16

**Chapter 16: Moving Out**

_ Click, click, click. Click, click, click._

Anna listened to the familiar rhythm as she snuggled deeper inside her sleeping bag, the night sky arching high overhead. Sandy always had the first shifts. Each night, she was the one to take the first of the look-out shifts to watch for moaners—_Well, _Anna thought, _guess we're calling them dead-beats now_—or raiders. And each night, after the campfire was put out and every one else was tucked away under blankets and in sleeping bags, she'd start spinning her blades. It was a constant rhythm that Anna had grown used to falling asleep to.

Sandy was gazing off on the edge of camp, keeping her nerves steady with busy hands. Anna's shift came next, and then Astrid's until dawn. Astrid had absolutely balked at the idea of Kristoff taking a shift, her trust still a little shaky on those grounds. They'd packed the tents back up after deciding the night was a bit too warm for them, though Anna had a suspicion that the real reason was so Astrid could keep her eyes on Kristoff for most of the night. Anna wondered if that girl would ever get over her trust issues. They were becoming a little concerning at times.

With a sigh, Anna closed her eyes, prepared to let the sounds of clicking blades lull her to sleep.

_Click, click, click. Click, click, click._

"Can you stop that?"

Anna's eyes shot open as she was brought back from the brink of sleep. She rolled over just in time to see Sandy pause and give Kristoff a sly smile before she started spinning her butterfly knives even faster.

_Clickclickclickclickclickclickclick._

There was a groan and the sound of rustling as Kristoff rolled over in his own sleeping bag, only to come face to face with Anna, his eyes illuminated by the light of the stars overhead.

"Oh, sorry," he mumbled. "Didn't realize you were awake."

She smiled. At the moment, it was just the two of them. Astrid had fallen asleep before anyone else, dropping off like a rock. Sven had settled down with Kristoff tucked into his side and was now snoring soundly. Sandy was focused on the moon-lit horizon.

"Don't worry," Anna consoled. "She'll stop after a while."

"Really?" he asked.

She gave an apologetic smile.

"No."

Kristoff let out another disgruntled moan.

"But you do get used to it," Anna added. "After awhile."

"Yeah, well, good thing I'm not looking to stick around long enough for that to happen."

Anna's smile faded slightly. It wasn't like she expecting Kristoff to stay. Not with the way they threatened, attacked, and blackmailed him. But still, it wasn't exactly the kindest statement.

"You really don't like us that much, do you?" Anna asked.

Kristoff blinked, slightly surprised by the question. He suddenly looked very uncomfortable. He shuffled around in his sleeping bag a bit and gave a shrug.

"Well what do you expect? I saw you guys kill somebody. Not exactly the best impression if you want to give off that 'safe group of people vibe.'"

Anna looked at Kristoff through the dark, her smile faded completely now.  
"He was a monster," she said quietly as she let Astrid's words fall out of her own mouth.

"He was a man."

"Is that what you call someone who did the things he did?"

The silence that fell to rest between them was still and only interrupted by the faint _click, click_ of Sandy's knives, the blonde oblivious to their conversation. Though Anna wasn't the biggest fan of Astrid's methods, she did see the point in them. Especially after seeing what had happened to Sandy and what it had done to her.

Anna knew she wouldn't be able to forgive anyone who was capable of doing something like that. She wasn't sure if she should trust someone who could.

"Is that what makes a man?"

* * *

Rapunzel let out a sigh, running her fingers through her still wet hair, only to have them catch in the knotted tendrils.

It was late. Very late. Much too late to come to grips with the fact that the world had ended nearly half a year ago, and she'd been ignorant to it this entire time. She closed her eyes and took in a steadying breath. She had to learn how to handle this. Mother wasn't here. Mother wasn't here to help her, to guide her, to tell her she'd be alright, and that she'd be safe. Mother wasn't here. She was on her own now.

"You alright there, Blondie?"

Rapunzel's head jerked up, eyes snapping open. It was Flynn.

The other's had left the kitchen at her own insistence to give her some space. She just needed some time alone to deal with the idea of the zombie apocalypse. At least, she'd thought she was alone. The appearance of the five foot, nine, scruffy, jean vest clad, hazel-eyed, would-be thief standing in the the entrance to the kitchen shattered that delusion. He was half-way to the pantry, mid-step as he looked at her with a raised eye-brow.

"Fine," she said a bit too quickly.

He took another step towards the pantry, eyes still focused on her with that cautious look.

"You sure?"

"Yeah."

Flynn continued to look at her. After a moment, he gave a shrug and continued towards his intended target.

"Look," he started off-handedly, a confidence in his tone as he opened the pantry door. Rummaging through its contents, he ran a hand through his hair and continued. "I know it's a lot to take in all at once—Ah!"

Rapunzel saw as he jerked his head back, his hand brushing over the spot where her frying pan had hit, his face wincing in pain. She leapt to her feet, empathetic guilt stabbing at her heart as she copied him with a wince of her own. Before she'd even thought about it, she'd made her way around to Flynn's side of the table.

"Ah, sorry about that," she said. "Here, let me take a look at it." She reached out, concern in her voice as she tried to get a look at the head injury. Rapunzel froze when she saw Flynn flinch at her hand. She let her hand fall, a new feeling twisting in her chest all of a sudden. It had been a reflex. She knew that. She'd attacked him, so it was only natural that he'd be afraid of her coming too close. But, still. She felt a pang in her heart. No one had ever been afraid of her before.

She carefully reached out again, her hand lower as she ignored the second involuntary twitch from the man.

"Here," she said quietly, taking his elbow. "I can help."

With a concerned glance and the slightest resistance from the brunette, Rapunzel managed to guide him to the kitchen table and sat him down in one of the chairs. She quickly fetched a first-aid kit from one of the cupboards. Standing behind him with the kit opened on the table, Rapunzel wove her fingers through his hair, parting it to get a look at the mark she'd left. There was blood, dried and dark and flaking that stuck to his scalp and matted his hair. Ouch. She'd hit him harder than she'd thought. There was even one spot where he was still bleeding.

Her fingers brushed over the sore area, drawing a hiss from her patient. She winced.

"Sorry," she muttered.

"It's fine," Flynn mumbled, his tone somewhat sour.

"No, I mean about hitting you," Rapunzel said. She reached over to the first-aid kit on the kitchen table and soaked a cotton ball in hydrogen peroxide. Flynn sat in silence. Moving back, Rapunzel dabbed at the wounded area, trying to be as gentle as possible as the disinfectant faintly hissed. She saw Flynn twitch slightly at the reaction of the chemical, but for the most part remained still.

"It's alright," Flynn said finally after a few more silent moments. "I'm sorry about scarring you."

A small smile flitted to Rapunzel's face, her heart lifting slightly with relief.

"It's alright," she said. She continued to clean the wound, picking out the bits of hair that were stuck in it. The silence continued, though a little less strained from before. After listening to the quiet seconds tick by, Rapunzel decided she didn't enjoy quiet.

"What were you looking for, anyways?" she asked curiously. "When you found me, I mean."

Flynn snorted.

"Somewhere to take a piss in some peace and quiet."

Rapunzel hesitated for a split second in her cleaning, startled by the answer.

"Is that hard to come by?"

"It is with this group," Flynn said. "Trust me, you don't want Jack to catch you with your pants down. Ever."

Rapunzel let out a small laugh.

"You guys seem to get a long well enough, though."

"Oh, we do. It's just Mr. Jack Frost always manages to find the most inopportune times to prank people."

Rapunzel let out a small laugh at the idea.

"Is name can't really be Jack Frost, though," she realized. "That's the name of a story book character."

"There anything wrong with a name that comes from a book?" Flynn asked, his tone rather indignant.

"No," Rapunzel said calmly. "I just find it strange, is all."

"Yeah, well, so does Bunny. He's been trying to get Jack's real name for weeks. I don't think he ever plans on sharing it, though. Come to think of it, he doesn't talk much about himself at all."

Rapunzel didn't answer. A thought had come to mind. She'd wondered about it vaguely ever since she'd met her trio of thieves, but had never really been given much time to dwell on it. Now, however, the thought had resurfaced with Flynn's mention of his friend. It was a thought about the strange, tall, green-eyed one of the group that was apparently from a different country.

"Is there something wrong with Bunny?" Rapunzel asked suddenly.

"No," came the answer. And then after a moment, "Why?"

"He talks…differently."

Flynn suddenly shifted in his seat. Rapunzel jumped and took her hands back in surprise as he turned around to give her a curious look.

"You mean his accent?"

_Accent._

She'd come across that word before. In a book she'd read. It was the type of word that she'd had to look up in the dictionary, even though it wasn't very long.

_An accent is a manner of pronunciation or speech peculiar to a particular individual, location, or nation._

She had never understood what that had meant. Everyone she'd ever met had all sounded and talked similarly. She'd never brought the word up to Mother either, afraid she'd be scolded for asking about the outside world. Rapunzel twisted the cotton ball in her fingers, eyes darting off to the side.

"Does…everyone talk like that?" she asked, hoping she didn't sound too ignorant.

"No. Well," Flynn amended with a shrug, "I mean, everyone has an accent. But they're all different. Bunny's from Australia. They talk different there, just like they talk different in Russia or India or Scotland."

The cotton ball came apart in her hands.

"Oh," she said quietly as she reached for a new one. She averted her gaze as Flynn continued to look at her. It was almost as if he was contemplating her, like she was something…strange. Rapunzel felt as her ears grew warm. She wished he'd look away.

"You've never heard an accent before, Blondie?" he asked finally.

Rapunzel shook her head.

"I've never really met too many other people," she said, her voice small and embarrassed.

She didn't know way she was acting this way. She'd never been one to get embarrassed in front of other people. She had never known anyone for a span of longer than a few hours besides Mother, so she never found much purpose in caring what other people thought of her. What was the point if they would never see her again anyways? But for some reason, she was caring now. Maybe it was the fact that she'd never met anyone quite like these three strangers spending the night in her home. Maybe it was because she'd just found out the world had ended and zombies were no longer a fictional fantasy kept safely between the pages of her books. Maybe it was the way Flynn was looking at her with those bright hazel eyes that were the perfect color for painting a desert landscape.

Whatever the reason was, Rapunzel was embarrassed and to top it all off, she was embarrassed for being embarrassed. She didn't like the feeling. Didn't like the heat in her ears or the twisting in her stomach. She especially didn't like the fact that Flynn would not. Stop. Starring at her. Seriously, what was his problem?

Finally, after a few more moments of that nerve-wracking stare, the brunette let out a sigh and shook his head.

"You need to get out more, blondie," he said as he turned back around in his seat. Rapunzel felt her stomach loosen as that gaze was finally turned away from her. "Maybe coming with us might do you some good after all," he added.

Rapunzel froze in the middle of reaching forward to finish cleaning Flynn's wound. She hadn't really thought of the offer Bunny had mentioned earlier. The one where she was invited to leaver her home with these strangers. Invited to leave the only place she'd ever known. The only place she knew as safe. Invited to leave and see the world. The world with its murderers and thieves and zombies. But also the world with its fantastic adventures and places like the pictures in her books. The world without Mother. The world without protection.

Flynn let out a yelp as she tugged a bit too forcefully on a lock of his hair, trying her best to get at the open wound on his head.

"You know, I don't think you should sleep tonight," Rapunzel said quickly, suddenly changing the subject.

"What?" Flynn asked, upset at the thought. "Why?"

"Because I think you have a concussion."

"So?"

"If you go to sleep, you might go into a coma and not wake up."

"Well that's just dandy," Flynn grumbled leaning forward to rest his elbow on the table and his chin in his hand.

"Stop moving!" Rapunzel ordered, exasperated as the wound she was working on was pulled away from her yet again.

"This is all your fault, you know," Flynn mumbled.

Rapunzel rolled her eyes.

"Quit being a baby."

"Wait, what are those?" Flynn asked suddenly, noticing the new tool Rapunzel wielded in her fingers as she came towards him.

She looked down at what was in her hand, then back to Flynn, concerned that he had to ask such for such an obvious answer.

"They're scissors. I have to cut your hair."

"YOU HAVE TO WHAT?!" the other man exclaimed, jumping out of his chair and away from the blonde with the blades, appalled by the suggestion.

"I have to give you stitches," Rapunzel explained, advancing with her sheers. "The hair would get trapped in the wound."

"Oh, no, blondie," Flynn said as he tripped over his own feet backing away from her as she followed him around the tiny kitchen in a circle. "You are getting nowhere near my hair with those things."

"Flynn, it's just hair."

"Says the girl who looks like she hasn't had a haircut in a decade."

"This will help you!"

"Like hell it will!"

Jack chuckled in the doorway of the kitchen, amused as he watched the blonde try to chase the man that was half a foot taller and at least thirty pounds heavier than her around the kitchen.

"Looks like they're getting along."

Jack turned to find Bunny standing behind him as he watched the spectacle along side the younger boy.

"Yeah," the shorter one agreed as he turned back to watch the other two. "Reminds me of when we first met, eh, big guy?" he asked, nudging Bunny in the side with his elbow.

The larger man cast an unamused glance at Jack.

"Not much has changed," he noted.

Jack rolled his eyes.

"Always this joyful, aren't you?" he said with a grin, watching as Rapunzel continued to chase the brunette, scissors branded.

Bunny scoffed.

"Sorry if I'm not the Easter Bunny," he said sarcastically. "But don't you think this might be a bit of an issue?" He gave a nod towards the commotion unfolding in the kitchen.

"What?" Jack said. "Nah, I think they're cute together. Besides," he added with a shrug, "we don't even know if she's going to come with us or not."

Bunny let out a sigh.

"I was hoping she would. Then I'd have at least one other person to keep an eye on you two."

"Hey, I'll have you know my level of maturity has officially outgrown whoopee cushions. I'm practically an adult."

"Right, and your being nearly twenty years old wouldn't have anything to do with that," Bunny grumbled with his own air of sarcasm. "Just make sure they don't kill each other," he finished as he turned to leave. "Remember, we're leaving in the morning. Find out if the sheila wants to come or not."

"You got it boss," Jack said, sending the Aussie off with a mock salute.

He turned back to find Flynn cornered against on of the kitchen cabinets, all while Rapunzel was trying to get at his hair with her scissors, practically climbing on top of him to do so.

_Yup,_ Jack thought to himself with a chuckle, _we'll all gonna get along just fine._

* * *

Rapunzel stared at the piece of paper in her hands, her mind still trying to comprehend what it said.

She was in her mother's room. Cardboard boxes were littered everywhere, stacked in corners and pilled on the bed, their tops opened and their contents strewn all about the place. Her hands had begun to shake as she looked at the piece of paper held out in front of her. She'd gone through everything. Looked through every single box and had torn the room apart looking for something, _anything_, that might tell her that this little piece of paper in front of her wasn't real.

But she hadn't found anything. All she had was this stupid paper with its stupid seal in the corner and its stupid fancy lettering. The paper crinkled as she gripped it tighter, trying to stop the tremor that had resurfaced in her hands again. Just how many times could someone's life fall to pieces right in front of them in a day before driving them insane? She was about to find out if things like this kept happening to her.

It was four in the morning. Jack and Bunny had gone to bed hours ago and Flynn, as far as she knew, had taken her advise and stayed up through the night in the kitchen downstairs. Before going off to bed, though, Jack had asked that question. That stupid question that everyone had already seemed to ask.

_"So you coming with us or not, princess?"_

She'd froze up. Stammered out that she didn't know yet. Of course she wanted to leave. Of course she wanted to escape the house she'd been locked in for eighteen years and leave to explore the world. But that world didn't exist anymore. That world was gone and all that was left were zombies and danger and infection and death. That wasn't the world she wanted to see. Especially with a group of would-be thieves that she'd only just met.

But then, she couldn't stay here either. Mother was dead after all. She was alone in this small house out in the middle of the woods with no one around to help or protect her. Imagine if Bunny, Jack, and Flynn really _had_ been bad men. She wouldn't have been able to fend them off all on her own. Then what would've happened? What if it happened again?

Choices, choices, choices. Mother had always called her fickle. She never could make up her mind. Should she stay behind, alone and scared as she waited for zombies or murderers to come and find her? Or should she leave to explore the world with excitement and adventure, going to sleep hungry every night and waking up every morning not knowing it it would be her last?

Neither looked to have a happy outcome.

That's why she was here, in her mother's room. Going through her collection of things and pictures and documents and Rapunzel's old artwork. Looking for something that could convince her to stay or leave. Something that could take away her doubt. Looks like she'd found it.

Very carefully, Rapunzel folded up the birth certificate in her hands and tucked it away in the pocket of her skirt, doing her best to keep her hands from shaking.

She came downstairs, the steps creaking in the quiet of the house, to find Flynn at the kitchen table. His upper half was sprawled across the table with one of Rapunzel's books held in front of him, a barely noticeable chunk of hair missing from his luxurious locks. He gave a quick glance at her when she entered and let out a sigh.

"Yeah, this 'staying up' thing is more difficult than I thought," he grumbled, closing the book and rubbing at his eyes. "What about you, Blondie? What're you doing up?"

Rapunzel shrugged, the image of that certificate flashing through her mind.

"Couldn't sleep." There was a moment's hesitation before she added, "I-I can help you stay awake, if you'd like."

Flynn looked up at her, letting his hands fall away from his face, surprised at the suggestion. Silence streathed between them as she waited for an answer.

* * *

"Hey, Sleeping Beauty, rise and shine."

Anna mumbled something before pulling her sleeping bag over her head and rolling over.

"Hey!"

The redhead was suddenly jarred awake by a pain in her side.

"_Kicking_ is rather unnecessary, don't you think?" she mumbled, whipping back the top of the sleeping bag to find the face of her tormentor looming over her.

Astrid scoffed.

"It's not if you're ignoring me."

Anna rolled her eyes. She sat up in her sleeping bag as she tried to rub the sleep out of her eyes. It was then she noticed something a little off. It was still dark. Dusk dark. The sun's rays had only barely begun to peek over the edge of the horizon.

"Astrid!" Anna whined in frustration. "The sky's not even awake yet, so why am I?"

"Because," Astrid said, swinging a heavy bag to land in Anna's lap, causing her to let out an "oof!" "You and Bozo over there need to get moving early if you want to find Elsa."

Anna's face fell. A small "oh," escaped her as she remembered her sister was still missing. She glanced over to find Kristoff, already awake and talking with Sven, switching the intonations of his voice as if he were trying to give the reindeer his own voice to talk back to him with.

"Right," she said as quickly stashing away her worry and guilt. She was out of her sleeping bag and had it packed away in a matter of minutes. After quickly running a brush through her hair and braiding it into two pigtails, Anna grabbed the backpack she'd packed last night.

The next twenty minutes had the Anna and Kristoff on the back of Sven, Kristoff in the front with Anna saddled behind, marching their way back into the city with Sandy waving silently at their backs as Astrid hollered at them not to get killed as way of a send off. For a creature so large and clumsy, Sven's movements were rather unsteady, rocking the two of his riders back and forth as he made his way over the cracked concrete and rubble of the interstate's off-ramp. At one particular unsteady lurch of their trusty stead, Anna was forced to lunge forward to warp her arms around Kristoff's waist, face pressed against his back as she nearly fell from her seat.

"Woah, hey," Kristoff protested, surprised by the sudden grip around his middle. "Don't get too comfy back there."

Anna let out an irritated huff, a faint blush sprouting across her cheeks.

"Then learn to keep your moose steady!"

"I already told you, he's a reindeer."

"Whatever he is, just keep him steady so I don't fall!"

"You know, that doesn't sound like a bad idea."

Anna gave an indignant gasp and swatted at Kristoff's shoulder.

The other man merely chuckled.

"Relax, would you? You're not going to fall."

Anna didn't answer and instead let out a huff and resigned herself to sitting back with a pout, gripping the edges of the saddle bags strapped to the large creature to keep from toppling over. Why they had saddle bags but no saddle was beyond her.

The two continued on in silence, eventually reaching the edge of the city just as the sun crested over the horizon behind them. The city in front of them was suddenly illuminated, the early morning sun's rays sending light spilling through the multiple empty roadways and streets. They were at the mouth of one of Detroit's main streets, hundreds of side streets branching off of it. Buildings arched high overhead, packed so tight and so numerous that it was impossible to see uninterrupted sky for more than a few feet. The city was huge, that was obvious. It's layout was expansive and just short of a labyrinth. The sun didn't help much as it cast dozens of long and ominous shadows across their path, creating the perfect cover for dead-beats to hide in.

"So," Kristoff said as they stood at the mouth of this incredible endeavor. "Where do you want to start?"

* * *

"Oi! Stop muckin' about, Jack!"

Rapunzel was jerked awake, those first few moments of panic that comes with being suddenly woken-up flooding through her system before she realized where she was. The couch. Living room. Her home.

There was commotion going on around her. People were moving about, shouting things and laughing at one another. Rapunzel blinked. That's right. Jack, Flynn, and Bunny. Her thieves that weren't really thieves that had broken in last night. Groggily sitting up, Rapunzel looked down in surprise when she realized she had a blanket draped over her. That was strange. Now that she thought of it, she hadn't even been near the couch most of the night. The last thing she remembered was staying up through the night with Flynn at the kitchen table to make sure he didn't fall asleep. She didn't remember falling asleep herself, much less how she managed to end up on the couch.

"Hey, look who it is!"

Rapunzel's thoughts were interrupted as Jack appeared at the end of the couch, his brown hair in an even messier state of bed head, if that was even possible.

"Our very own Snow White. You sleep well, princess?"

Rapunzel gave a small smile.

"I slept fine, thank you."

She glanced at the others as they moved through the house, doors slamming and floorboards creaking.

"Are you guys getting ready to leave?"

"Too right, sheila."

Bunny had appeared in the doorway, leaning against its frame with his arms crossed as he looked at the pair in the living room.

"And we'll get to it, too."

"As soon," a third voice joined in as Flynn appeared to fill the rest of the doorway to the living room. "as you tell us whether you're coming with us or not, Blondie."

Rapunzel blinked. She still had to make a decision. She'd completely forgotten. She still had to choose whether to stay or leave with these three men now standing around her living room. She looked around to each of them, her heart suddenly picking up speed. She still wasn't sure. She'd lived in this house all her life. The thought of leaving someplace so familiar was terrifying, especially since she didn't know what she'd find out there in the big bag world. What would Mother think? What would Mother tell her to do?

Rapunzel opened her mouth to respond. The words caught in her throat as she froze, her hand brushing against something in her pocket. Realization came flooding back to her as she wrapped her fingers around the piece of paper still folded in her skirt pocket and remembered what it was she'd had stashed away there.

Rapunzel shut her mouth quickly, looked down at her lap, her hand making a fist around that stupid piece of paper with its stupid fancy lettering and stupid gold seal. She looked back up.

"Alright," she said, trying to make her smile look like this wasn't the most terrifying decision of her life. "I'll come with you."

Fifteen minutes later, Rapunzel was rushing down the stairs, a bag packed and in tow as her hair trailed along behind her. She tore through the living room and only stopped after she'd banged through the front door to find Bunny standing there, a bag at his feet. He flashed her a smile and patted her on the back.

"Welcome aboard, sheila."

Before she could respond, Rapunzel heard her name.

"Ah, Rapunzel."

She looked around to find a large, black truck sitting a few yards away on the lawn. The bed of it was filled with a small pile of bags. Amidst them stood Jack, calling at her from the bed of the truck.

"You might wanna change into some jeans."

Rapunzel looked down at her flowing pink skirt that ended around her shins. It was the type of thing she'd worn all her life.

"What, why?" she asked, confused as she looked back up at him.

"Skirt's basically a fishing line for zeds," Jack explained, "with you as the bait. Once one of them gets ahold of it, they're not letting go."

"Oh, well, I don't really have anything else."

"Doesn't matter," Bunny interrupted with a shake of his head. "We'll find something for you along the way."

And with that, the large Australian hefted the large duffle at his feet onto his shoulder and started walking towards large and intimidating truck parked on her front lawn.

"Let's move out," he said as he tossed the duffle to Jack, who then situated it among the other bags in the bed of the truck.

"And remember to stick to the backroads to avoid those pile-ups," Bunny said to Flynn as he climbed into the cab of the truck, riding shotgun as the brunette drove.

The car started up with a roar as Jack waved Rapunzel over.

Rapunzel stared out at them from the edge of her front porch. These three men that had broken into her house and turned her life upside down in the space of one night. And now she was leaving with them. She didn't even know them, really. They were still complete strangers. But there was something about them. Something she couldn't quite place. But it was something that told her that these were good people. These were safe people. People she could trust.

Rapunzel took one last glance at the house she'd spent the last eighteen years of her life in. It towered over her, its shadow swallowing her in it's darkness. For some reason, it was a lot scarier than she remembered. This place she'd called home for her entire life was now alien and strange. She didn't know why, but she felt a sensation in her heart telling her that she didn't want to be near this place a second longer. And with that, Rapunzel turned back towards the truck and took that first step off her front porch and into the real world.

* * *

**A/N: Ahhhhh! D: it's been a while. Sorry, had a brutal summer class. But it's over now and more updates are soon to follow ^.^**


	18. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17: Finders, Keepers**

Hiccup woke with a start to the _Wump!_ of something large and heavy landing near his head.

"Wha' the bloody hell is this?"

"Wha…?" Hiccup started, still trying to gain his surroundings through his sleep-riddled head. He rolled over to his back and raised himself onto his elbows as he blinked away the blurriness of sleep to find a mass of red curls standing over him, sky blue eyes glaring down at him. He took a quick a look around. He didn't see Toothless and figured the dog was out, sniffing around the house or with the Other DunBrochs. Hiccup's gaze froze as his eyes landed on a black duffle bag that had been thrown onto the nightstand by his bed. Hiccup shot up to a sitting position.

"My bag…Where'd you get that?" he asked, looking back up at Merida. It was the duffle bag he'd left home with. He hadn't seen it in weeks, so he'd just assumed the DunBrochs had overlooked it when they'd taken him with them while he was unconscious. He'd expected to never see it again.

"An' jus' wha' the hell do yeh think yer doin' caryin' around somethin' liek this?" Merida asked, ignoring his own question.

"Well, obviously, I wasn't the one caring it around for the past few weeks. That was you."

Merida continued to glare at him, obviously unamused by his first class sass. Suddenly, she reached down and yanked the bag open. Hiccup's gaze fell to the bag, its guts now laid out for all to see. His expression fell.

"You went through my bag?"

"Bet yer bloody arse Aye did. Good thing, too."

Hiccup looked back up to round face above him, bright blue eyes livid as they bore into him. He didn't get it. This girl had hardly spoken to him at all for the past three weeks that he'd been traveling with the DunBrochs, and now, all of a sudden, here she is, accusing him of…wait, what _was_ she accusing him of? She'd found his duffle bag. Big deal. It's not like he'd even had access to it for the past few weeks, much less been able to use what was inside.

"So just what's your question here?" Hiccup asked, trying to get a handle on the situation.

"Yeh see, wha' Aye'm wonderin' hear is jus' why does one person need to be carryin' so much heat wit them?" Merida asked as she jabbed her finger at his still open duffle bag, no doubt referring to the nearly ten guns packed inside.

* * *

"Tell me again why we're doing this?"

Anna rolled her eyes.

"We're looking for my sister. You know, I'm starting to think Astrid was right about you."

"I know that," Kristof shot back, glancing over his shoulder at the redhead saddled behind him. "But I thought she ran away from the group. Why are you looking for her if she left you?"

Anna's face fell. Without even looking, Kristoff could feel as she shrank away form him, moving back a few inches on their swaying stead as they continued further into the ruined and abandoned city. Dilapidated buildings continued to pass by them on either side, some only half-standing, while others were barely more than pile of rubble. A breeze spun around them, stirring the garbage and trash that littered the street as the sun continued to rise over the horizon behind them.

"She's my sister," she said quietly. "I can't just leave her."

"Why'd she run away in the first place?"

Anna let out a sigh as she gazed off to find yet another empty street pass by on their right, no sign of her sister in sight.

"Because it's what she does," Anna finally said. "She likes to be alone, and I think that's why she ran off. Elsa's always been…distant. I mean, we used to get along great as children. She used to be my best friend. And then…I don't know. Then I just stopped seeing her. She stopped coming out of her room and stopped talking to me. At first, I thought I'd done something wrong. I thought she was mad at me and that I had to fix it. But then I realized, it wasn't just me. She stopped talking to everybody. No one would see her for weeks on end because she just wouldn't come out of her room. The maids went in to clean and take food to her—"

"Wait, wait, wait."

Anna stopped, puling back to look at Kristoff in surprise. He twisted in his seat far enough to give her a disbelieving look.

"You had _maids_?"

Anna furrowed her eye brows, a pout forcing its way to her mouth.

"We lived in a big house," she defended herself.

Kristoff rolled his eyes as he turned back around to face the road.

"Geez, talk about spoiled rich kids."

"All right then, mister high and mighty," Anna huffed. "What kind of family do you have?"  
"Had."

Anna blinked in surprise. An uncomfortable silence fell between them, the atmosphere suddenly losing it's mood.

"…Sorry."

"It's fine," Kristoff said with a shrug. "Who hasn't lost their family by now, right?"

"Do you miss them?"

"Of course. I came from a big family. Well, came from probably isn't the right phrase. More like taken in by."

"You were adopted?"

"Yup, me and this big lug here," he said, reaching down to give Sven a pat on the neck. "Taken in by the biggest, rowdiest, _loudest_ family North of the boarder. I always called them a bunch of trolls. But they were good people. All of them. Took care of Sven and me as if we were really there's. Couldn't ask for better."

"What happened to them?"

Kristoff let out a sigh. He continued to look straight ahead, so Anna couldn't get a look at his face, but she could see as his shoulders slumped forward just the tiniest bit. When he finally answered, it wasn't with the same lively voice he normally had.

"Caught the virus. The older ones did, at least. I was a town over, selling refrigerators when the virus started getting bad. As soon as I heard, I rushed back home, but it didn't matter. There wasn't a cure. There was nothing I could do. Next thing I knew, the younger ones had caught it, too. And then, it was only a matter of time before I was on my own."

"The same thing happened to my parents," Anna said in a quiet voice.

"I'm sorry."

"Me, too."

Silence settled on them again, the only noise being the clop clop of Sven's hooves on pavement and the wobbling whistle of the wind snaking its way through the empty city streets. They continued to pass empty street after empty street, Anna's directions keeping them away from the more zombie infested parts of the city. After a few more minutes ticked by each of the two reindeer riders lost in their own thoughts, Kristoff broke the silence.

"So your sister," he started. "If she's so determined to be on her own, why not let her?"

"Like I said," Anna said with a shrug. "We're sisters. I can't just give up on her. Even though she keeps shutting me out, I can't stop trying. Does that make sense?"

Kristoff glanced over his shoulder at her, an understanding smile on his face.

"Yeah. She's your family. And that's what family's for, right?"

* * *

Hiccup stared at the open duffle bag and then looked back up at Merida.

"It's protection," he said with a shrug, eyes darting away. "You do the same exact thing."

"No, it's not," Merida said pointedly. "Protection is carryin' around a sword or a bow. Packin' twenty guns wit yeh liek your afraid to loose them is _not_ protection."

"What's it matter to you?" Hiccup asked, gaze snapping back to the Scotts girl standing over him. "They're mine, anyways. If you didn't like them, why'd you take them in the first place?"

"Aye took them because Aye wanted teh know why yeh had them."

"Took an awful long time to ask, then, didn't you?"  
"Wha' Aye choose teh do wit mai tyme is mai business!"

"It's not if you're carrying _my_ guns around with you!"

"Oh, so they are yours?"

Hiccup froze, his face falling. Silence draped over them, swallowing his words. He swallowed and ripped his gaze away from the redhead to stare at the covers pulled across his lap.

"No, they're not."

"Aye knew it. Yeh stole them didn't yeh?"

"They're my Dad's."

Merida practically choked.

"Y-Yer…"

"Yeah," Hiccup muttered, still looking at his lap. "My Dad used to take me shooting and hunting with him when I was younger. I wasn't any good at it and pretty soon he stopped bringing me all together. We never really got along when I got older, so those hunting trips are the few good memories I have left of him."

The room fell quiet, Hiccup's words hanging in the air as Merida continued to stare at him. Memories of her own father taking her on hunting trips flashed through her mind's eye. She didn't know much about the scrawny boy with the missing foot sitting in the bed right in front of her, but she did realize he wasn't with anyone except for that bloody dog when they'd found him. That was enough to assume the worst of his family.

"Tch."

The silence was interrupted as Merida made a disgusted sound in her throat. Hiccup looked up, surprised by the sound, only to find the other girl leaning in towards him, hands braced on either side of him and invading his space as a snarl graced her features.

"Aye don' care where they come from," she hissed at him. "Jus' keep the damned things away from mai family, got it?"

Without another word, the redhead straightened up and spun in her heal, slamming the door behind her as she left. Hiccup stared at the closed door in stunned silence, wondering what the hell had just happened. It took him a few dazed moments before his gaze fell to his duffle bag that she'd left sitting on the nightstand.

* * *

"No way!"

"No, it's totally true! Swear to God."

"You really used to talk to paintings?"

Anna snorted through her own laugher, Kristoff's rolling laugh joining hers.

"Okay," she said through gasps of air. "But that's not near as weird as giving your reindeer a voice."

"What?" Kristoff asked, affronted. "I didn't give him anything. That's his actual voice."

To which Anna's response was another fit of laughter, rocking back in her seat on the reindeer's back.

They'd been at it for hours. The sun had risen high over the tops of the city buildings and began to beat down on them. The day had mostly been spent trudging along in a silence that was only occasionally interrupted by discussions and conversations about what their lives had been before the virus hit. The hours wore on, one by one, with only empty ally ways to discouraging them. Eventually, they stumbled onto topics and stories that had them laughing hard enough to burst at the seams. There had been one incident, where the sound of their laughter had attracted a few shambling dead-beats, but with some lucky maneuvering, they managed to avoid a fight. From then on, the two were careful to keep their laughter as quiet as possible.

Kristoff was still doubled over the Sven's reigns, laughing as quietly as he could, when he suddenly felt a hand grip his shoulder.

"Krsitoff, shut up."

The blonde glanced over his shoulder at Anna, his laughter dying in an instant when he saw her face.

"Do you hear that?" she asked, her voice urgent as her eyes darted from building to building, the look on her face that same as a mother's who's child had been submerged under water for too long, desperately looking for any sings of life.

Kristoff pulled on the reigns, bringing Sven to a stop as he reached down to rub his stead's neck reassuringly. And then, Kristoff froze, his ears straining as a distant sound filtered through the air to them.

"Gunshots…?" he muttered, trying to locate where the sound was coming from.

"It's Elsa."

Krsitoff spun around, his head snapping up at the comment.

"What? How do you know?"

"Because I just do," Anna said, still staring off into the distance at the buildings that surrounded them. "Come on," she said suddenly as she gripped his shoulder tighter. "She's that way."

Kristoff gave a tug of the reigns and directed Sven in the direction of Anna's pointing. With some hit and miss navigating, the three travelers came upon a skyscraper that reached towards the heavens. It was disheveled, as were most buildings after the panic from the virus hit. Graffiti left colorful murals and tag art over the grungy looking walls. A good deal of the windows had been knocked out as well, leaving the building to look like a soulless shell.

And then, near the top of this eighty-story monster of a building, Anna and Kristoff could see flashes of light, the sounds of gunshots appearing to be coming from the same place.

There was a sudden, Earth-shattering scream as something fell out of one of the windows. A dead-beat landed a few feet away from them with a wet _crack!_, its brains splattering all over the sidewalk in some twisted for of new-aged street art, the impact making both humans and reindeer jump.

The next thing Kristoff saw was Anna running full-tilt towards the building, lute in hand. He hadn't even realized she'd dismounted. With a quick shout at Sven to "Stay!" Kristoff grabbed his pick-axe and sprinted after Anna into the black and ominous mouth of the building's empty front doors.

* * *

The days continued to tick by, one by one. With each passing sunset, Hiccup grew healthier and healthier. His fever had broken, and he's stump had healed enough that he even managed to hobble around with a crutch and his prosthetic for an hour or two at a time.

Fergus had even taken up to teaching Hiccup to sword fight, when he had the strength for it. Hours would be spent with the two of them hobbling around on fake legs, lunging at each other with swords from Fergus's apparently eternal armory, the large Scotts man shouting tips and pointers to the scrawny brunette, with Toothless watching curiously from the sidelines. As time wore on, Hiccup found himself being able to spend more and more time with the DunBrochs, as opposed to observing them from a sick-room. He'd and Toothless would play with the triplets, the canine playfully nipping at toes and noses. Hiccup had even managed to set up a sort of sign language with the three little ones, finding a way to communicate and talk with them. He'd even found himself in the kitchen more than once with Elinor, learning to cook and finding a situation he had never experienced before: talking with a mother.

After the run-in with Merida, Hiccup had decided to chuck the guns. She was right, after all. There really was no reason for him to be caring so many of them around, other than for nostalgia. And he didn't even need them all for that. Not to mention they were practically useless for the most part without a silencer. Guns, with their loud explosions, were the surest way to attract the infected. Instead, Hiccup had elected to keep two handhelds, tucked into the back waistband of his pants. The rest of the guns and the duffle bag were left behind as the group moved on to the next house.

The absence of the duffle had not gone unnoticed by Merida. Hiccup could see as the redhead became noticeably less tense when near him. Not that that one duffle bag had solved everything. The redhead was still cold towards him, barely sparing him more than a few clipped sentences. More than often, he'd caught her glaring at him in the midst of Fergus's fencing lessons or playing with the triplets or talking with Elinor. Not that Hiccup hadn't tried to break the ice with her. He'd attempted more than a few times to strike up a conversation with the girl, only to get a cold shoulder in response. No matter what he did, the redhead continued to hate him, and with no clear explanation as to why.

"Aye told them teh leave yeh, yeh know."

The family was just about to settle down for the night, with Elinor, Fergus, and the boys huddled around a fire set alight in the fireplace they'd found in the living room of their newly commandeered house. The boys sat, destracted with poking and teasing each other as Fergus bellowed out a story he must've told a dozen times by now. He and Merida were removed slightly from the others. The redhead was sprawled out on the couch. Hiccup was sitting with his back propped up against a soft arm-chair, using the light of the fire to draw a few rough sketches in his note-pad as Toothless rested curled against his side. Hiccup looked up in surprise at the sudden comment, turning his eyes on the redhead that had her head resting on one of the couches arm rests.

"What?" he asked.

"Mai Mum an' Dah'd," she explained without taking her eyes off her family gathered around the fireplace. "When we found yeh, Aye told them teh leave yeh teh die. Told 'em yeh weren't worth the trouble."

Hiccup stared at her for a few tense seconds, this new-found information still processing.

"Well," he said finally. "That's rather romantic."

Merida scoffed as she dragged her gaze away from the fire-place pow-wow to glare at Hiccup.

"Don' get it wrong, yeh nob. Aye'm still waitin' fer the first chance to kick you an' yer mutt teh the curb." She turned to look at her family once more, her eyes growing distant and her voice becoming low. "So don' think yer free teh get comfy. Yer not stayin' fer long. Aye'll make sure of that," she muttered into couch's the armrest, knowing full well that Hiccup could still hear every word.


	19. Chapter 18

**Chapter 18: Where are we going?**

"AHHHHHHH—HAHAHA!"

Rapunzel's screams dissolved into giggles as she reached up to let her fingers weave through the air, the wind pushing her hair back to billow behind her in a golden streamer. Her toes curled into the upholstery of the center backseat of the truck, the edge of the open sunroof digging into her stomach as she leaned forward over the roof of the car. She closed her eyes, the biggest grin spread across her face as she felt everything rush through her veins. Feeling that summer breeze and the way it was calling her. Feeling like she could fly, like she could do anything. For like the first time ever, she was completely free.

Rapunzel came back inside the cab of the truck, plopping down on to the middle seat with a giggle as the wind whistled overhead.

"Well," Bunny said with a smirk as he looked in the rearview mirror at her, he and Flynn having switched seats since their early start. "Sounds like someone's having fun."

Rapunzel simply let out another laugh, her eyes lighting up as she rolled back into her seat situated behind the passenger's side.

They'd been on the road for hours and still weren't out of the backwater country part of the state. Even though they were the only ones out on the road, they were taking it slow. It wasn't like they were in a rush or on a time table, anyways. For the most part, they'd stuck to the back roads, the main ones having apparently been choked up with abandoned cars littering the highways and interstates. Even still, they found themselves maneuvering around tractors and trailers and other cars left on these barely traveled backroads, forcing them to move even slower. And then, every once in a while, they'd have a stretch of uninterrupted road, where they could floor it and stick their heads and hands out the windows and sunroof, enjoying the rush of air.

"So how did you guys find each other?" Rapunzel asked, excitement and energy coursing through her. She needed a distraction, or else she was sure she'd start bouncing off the walls. Not to mention, she still knew very little about these thieves of hers that had whisked her away from everything she'd ever known. She leaned forward between the two front seats, chin resting on the back of Flynn's seat.

"I'm sure that's a question for Flynn, over here," Bunny said with a nod towards the brunette.

Rapunzel turned her large green eyes on him expectantly, her smile managing to draw a chuckle form him.

"Alright, alright," he said. "I guess the beginning was when I was making my way across the country, trying to get the hell out of Indiana and towards these refugee camps I'd heard about in D.C.. When, suddenly, I come across this abandoned university. And I thought, hey, college kids gotta have some food stashed away in dorms and what not. So I make my way onto the campus only to find one very jumpy and very violent Australian that hadn't left with all the other students."

"Bunny, you were at university?" Rapunzel asked, curious only because she'd never seen a college campus before.

"Yeah, nah. Came over here to study at a good 'American' school, and next thing I know, they've shut down the borders, everyone's sick, and they've evacuated the school. I had nowhere else to go, so I set up camp," the Australian said with a shrug.

"And so after that almost deadly run in," Flynn continued. "Bunny decided he'd run with me to the East Coast so he could find a boat to get back to his family in Australia."

"Do you think they're still alive?" Rapunzel asked.

"No way to say for sure, love," Bunny said, keeping his eyes on the road. "I'm hoping for the best, and right now, that's all I've got. Figured it's at least worth the shot."

After another moment, Flynn picked up again with his story.

"And so after I team up with Out Back here, we're making our way through Kentucky, when we run into this idiot," he jerked his thumb in Jack's direction, "that's wondering around, like he's so lost he can't tell which way is up. Anyways, we pick him up and a few weeks later, we find you."

"Jack," she asked turning to the other boy riding in the back with her. "I thought you were from Maine, what were you doing in Kentucky?"

He shrugged, nonchalant, that confident smile constantly on his face, as if that was his default.

"Like Flynn said, I got turned around, ended up far from where I wanted to be."

"When did you leave?" she asked.

"Near the beginning of the outbreak. My adoptive family caught the virus pretty quick and I decided to leave home not long after."

"And you were all by yourself when you left?"

Jack paused, his smile faltering only just slightly. He adjusted his grip on his staff that was propped up vertical, its end resting on the floor of the car. He turned away from Rapunzel to look at the other two sitting up front, his smile a bit too stiff.

"Yeah," he said. "It was just me until I met these two knuckle-heads," he finished with a nod towards Bunny and Flynn.

"Wow," she said quietly. "I can't imagine being alone for so long."

"Yeah," he said with a sigh, leaning back into his seat. He turned away from her completely then to look out the window, so she couldn't see his face. She could hardly hear what he said next. "Wasn't much fun."

The car grew quiet and Rapunzel could feel as the mood changed. She felt as her heart sank slightly at the sight of Jack turning away from her. From what she knew of Jack, he seemed like a lively person, always laughing or cracking jokes with his wide smile. But now…he was suddenly distant. Removed. Rapunzel turned back to face the front, fingers twisting around her hair as she bit her lip. She knew enough to know not to push the subject any more.

"How about you Flynn?" she asked, trying to change topics.

"What about me?"

"Where'd you come from?" she asked leaning forward between the two seats again. "What were you doing when the virus hit? What was you're life like before HSE?"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa!" he defended, throwing up his hands and pulling away so that his back pressed into the car door. "Sorry, Blondie. I don't do backstory, however I am becoming very interested in yours. How do you know so much about concussions and sewing up wounds?"

Rapunzel crinkled her nose slightly. What was it with these people? Ask them to talk about themselves and all of a sudden, they clam up. Except for Bunny, of course. But again, Rapunzel didn't push it and leaned back in her seat to answer.

"Mother never took me to any hospitals or doctors. She didn't like them. So, whenever I would hurt myself from playing in the woods, or whenever I'd get sick, Mother would take care of me. She taught me to set a broken bone and how to stitch up a cut in case anything happened when she wasn't there. I also know the names and uses of different medicines."

"Looks like we've got our very own medic on the team, then," Bunny said with a smile.

Rapunzel giggled and leaned forward again to ask another question.

Jack didn't hear what Rapunzel asked next. He'd tuned them out, their conversations fading into the distance as he continued to look out the window. Trees flashed by them, one by one, turning into a blur of greens and browns as they continued down the road. He let out a sigh and leaned his head against the cool window, the conversations in the car continuing around him without him even hearing a word of them.

—

A couple of hours and a few pit stops and seat exchanges later, the four of them had pulled up outside a fire station on the edge of small town that was practically in the middle of nowhere. A single garage door stood open in front of them, showing only an enormously empty garage that would've once held an actual fire truck. As it was, the open garage was rather bare, a few spare hoses and other supplies strewn about as cracked and faded pictures of smiling firemen lined the walls. The group of four had pulled the truck into the garage and then pilled out, limbs stretching and joints popping as they moved around.

Bunny and Flynn were the ones that had managed to break open the station door while Jack circled around back to find a generator that was still hooked up. Jack managed to get it started up with a roar, causing all the lights in the station to come on. Once they'd situated themselves inside, Rapunzel immediately dashed to the kitchen. She flitted about it, humming as she went through all the cupboards to find a couple of cans and other non-perishables that had been left behind. She set to cooking a meal for all of them, Flynn having been her recruit to help her in the kitchen. The two joked and nudged at each other as they cooked, Flynn scowling at Rapunzel's teasing once she'd figured out that he didn't know how to cook.

Meanwhile, Bunny sat at the kitchen table, a map laid out before him as he tracked their course. The Australian had told Jack to bugger off out of the kitchen for being "a bloody obnoxious drongo," leaving the skinny brunette to explore the fire station and mess with numerous amounts of gadgets and things.

By the time they all had sat down to a rather satisfying dinner, the sun had already begun to set and had almost disappeared by the time they'd finished. In the midst of cleaning up their leftovers and dishes, Jack had apparently managed to find a stereo system in an open, living-room-like room on the second floor. This lead the next hour or so to being filled with music and laughter as Rapunzel and Jack danced in the middle of the fire station, spinning and twirling. Golden hair streaked behind her as the skinny brunette playfully chased her around the station, up the stairs and down the fireman's pole. Jack had even made a very poor attempt at pole dancing, much to the amusement and laughter of everyone else.

"Come on! Dance with us!" Rapunzel called out, a smile lighting up her face as she reached towards the two that had chosen to sit out amongst all the dancing and chasing. She'd broken away from Jack, leaving the boy to do his own jerky sort of jig in the middle of the living area, and had come over to where Flynn and Bunny were, watching the festivities from the sidelines. Flynn was leaning against a railing that lined a side of the room, the other side of it over looking the first floor of the station down below, a lazy smile on his face. Meanwhile, Bunny was perched atop the rail above the first, his abnormally long feet bouncing against the bars in time with the rhythm.

An upbeat tune was playing. One Rapunzel had never heard before about revolutions and waking up to a new age. She could feel the rhythm of the song down to her core and her face was flushed from dancing, stray hairs sticking to her forehead from the sweat and exertion.

"I'm not one for dancin' sheila," Bunny said with a shake of his head. He nodded towards Flynn. "This one might be, though."

Rapunzel's expectant and excited gaze landed on the unsuspecting brunette.

"Oh, no, blonde," the younger of the two men started, raising his hands in protest as he backpedalled. "I don't dance."

"'Course yah do," Bunny interrupted. "All yah need is a _push_."

And with that, the Australian gave Flynn a good shove in the back with his foot, sending him to stumble forward. In the next moment, Rapunzel had him by the hand and had dragged him to the middle of the floor, encouraging him and laughing all the way. Before Flynn even had a chance to protest, he was dancing with the blonde, twirling her around and swaying with her as her green eyes lit up, a wide smile stretching her face as she looked up at him.

Bunny simply laughed when he caught the accusing look from the shorter man, now being spun around the open living room. It was obvious Flynn wasn't really that upset about Bunny's move considering all three of them continued to dance late into the night, laughter and music ringing out to bounce between the thick, brick walls of the station.

* * *

Screams rang through the house, yelling and cursing barreling down hallways, only to get caught and ricochet inside rooms.

"I've just about had enough of you, lass!"

"You walk around tellin' me what teh do, what not teh do! Trying teh make me be like you! Well, Aye'm not going teh be like you!"

"Ach! You're acting like a child!"

"If yeh'd just _listen_—!"

"I am your _mother_! You listen to _me_!"

The screams and hollers and yells kept coming. The cacophony wasn't made any easier with Fergus banging on the door Merida and Elinor were fighting behind, ordering to be let in. Not to mention the giggles and playful fights the triplets were now instigating among themselves, the sounds of the screaming match having inspired them. Hiccup sat with Toothless curled up next to him on the couch in the living room, the brunette bent over a book. The words on the page went unheeded as he strained his ears to listen to the fighting in the other room and waited for the outcome. The fights and yelling between the two DunBroch women were not a new experience for Hiccup. The pair were always clashing heads. This one seemed worse than all the other fights he'd heard, though.

It had all started when Merida had come in late again after leaving the house to hunt on her own. She'd come back to a worried Elinor, the questions of where she'd been and what she'd been doing soon escalating into a screaming match. Only instead of the whole thing blowing over in a few short minutes, the yelling and arguments and accusations raged on for over ten minutes, before Hiccup heard one last holler of frustration and a bang.

The next thing Hiccup knew, a flurry of red hair rushed by him.

"Hey, where are you—?"

Before he could even finish, the Scotts girl was through the front door, leaving it to swing shut with a bang. Shouts and protests of "Merida!" followed after her, completely ignored.

Without thinking twice, Hiccup stood up from the couch, only to stumble and topple over to the ground with his still unsteady leg. He scrambled to his feet again, using Toothless to help push himself up and wobble as quickly as he could out the door after the hot-headed teen.

He stumbled out onto the street, Toothless lopping along beside him. Spinning around, Hiccup quickly found a blotch of orange among the gray and washed out landscape of abandoned homes. She was storming down the street to his right, her bow slung around her shoulder as she walked away from the house, grumbling something to herself.

"Hey!" Hiccup called as he started hobbling towards the escaping teen.

She gave a short pause to turn over her shoulder. When she saw who it was, Merida turned back around with a disapproving snort and continued walking away from the house.

"Wha' do _you_ want?"

"I want to help!"

Hiccup stumbled, catching himself on Toothless before standing upright again.

"Ay, well yeh can stop bumpin, yer gums an' leave me alone," Merida scoffed as she kept walking. "Aye don' need yer help!"

"How do you know that if you haven't given me a chance!"

"Leave me alone!"

"Look, could you please just _listen_ to me?!"

Merida froze. She stood there in the middle of the street, fists clenched, shoulders tense. After a moment, she whipped her head around, casting a scathing look at Hiccup over her shoulder, before turning and walking up the steps of a nearby house to sit on the front porch with her arms crossed. It took him some time, but Hiccup eventually managed to wobble his way over to the house Merida was pouting in front of with Toothless trotting along behind him. Hiccup sank down at the the top of the steps on the other end of where Merida sat hunched over her lap with her arms crossed. He let out a sigh and angled himself to lean back against a porch post as Toothless sat on his hunches at the foot of the stairs, diligently keeping watch.

There were a few silent moments filled with Toothless's quiet panting and glaring glances cast towards Hiccup by Merida.

"So," the brunette started. "Just what happened in there?"

"'Wha' happened'?" Merida scoffed. "Wha' happened is mai mum's a stark raving lunatic. She's alway tellin' me wha' teh do, how teh do it. How teh behave. How Aye needed teh be in school. Who Aye could an' couldn't date. An' now, it's all, 'Don' leave the house. Stay were we can see ye, lass.' Aye'm a prisoner in mai own house!" she finished with a huff, face slightly red in her anger, her hair a bit frizzier than normal.

"Well, technically, it's not even your house."

Merida let out a frustrated groan and threw her hands up, red curls flying everywhere. She made to stand up, apparently already fed up with him.

"No, no, wait," Hiccup said with a small chuckle, rather amused by how easy it was to rile her up.

"Yeh blastid nob," she grumbled. As she made it to the bottom of the steps, she swung around, pointing a finger at the older boy. "Aye'm tryin' teh be serious an' yer–yer jus'—"

"No, wait, I'm sorry," Hiccup said while trying to suppress his laughter. "Come back," he urged, waving his hands to tell her to come back to the porch. "I'll be serious."

Merida gave another dubious glare at him, contemplating whether or not the risk of being made fun of was worth coming back to the porch. After a couple more seconds of her refusing to move, Hiccup broke the silence.

"Look, your mom's a control freak," he said, his palms open and upwards as he leaned forward. "I get it, I do. But running away from something like that isn't going to help anyone."

The redhead scoffed, her curls bouncing around her face as she folded her arms.

"Ay, an' how would _ye_ know?"

"Because my dad was the same way."

Hiccup could see as his words hit her. It wasn't like a blow to the chest or anything so drastic. It was much more subtle, but the effect was still noticeable. Her gaze froze as it fell to land on him. And it was then, for what was probably the first time in all the weeks Hiccup had known her, that the redhead looked at him. As in, actually _looked_ at him. No one-sided glares or harsh glances. She met his eyes and looked at him, contemplating, observing, learning.

She finally gave a scoff. She rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, offering only one word in response.

"How?"

Hiccup blinked, having not expected that response. He didn't know _what_ he was expecting, but it hadn't been that. He leaned back slightly, swallowing as he thought of a response.

"Well," he started, eyes darting to the ground, "he always tried to make me into something I'm not. When I was younger, he'd always take me camping and hunting with him. It was like our thing. Dad and son stuff, you know? Then, sometime after my mom left, he'd try to convince me to stay behind. He'd say I wasn't cut out for it. He'd leave on his own, bags weighed down with guns and tents," Hiccup paused, memories flicking through his mind as he stared at the ground. "And vodka," he said in a low voice, almost like he hadn't realized he'd said it. "He never knew I knew, but I'd always catch a glimpse of it. The three or so handles in his bag that would always be gone when he came back."

Hiccup let out a sigh, glancing up at Merida to see if she was still listening. Her gaze hadn't moved from him. He looked away again, hoping she hadn't noticed.

"And as I got older," Hiccup continued, "he'd try to get me into all sorts of things. Sports, mostly. But there was carpentry or sharpshooting, too. Anything he thought 'a man should be doing.' But I wasn't that kind of person. I wan't the kind of person to do those sorts of things. I wasn't like him. I guess he couldn't see that," Hiccup said as he bent his head to stare at his hands. "He never could understand me."

The brunette's words trickled off into silence, a noiseless air hanging between the two in front of that abandoned house on that abandoned street of an entire world that seemed to have been abandoned. Hiccup continued to stare at his hands, rubbing his thumbs together as his thoughts continued to churn on.

Without looking up, Hiccup heard a sigh and the old, wooden front steps creak as a weight was settled on them. He looked up to find a orange cloud of curls. Merida had sat herself on the other side of the stairs, a few steps below him so he couldn't see her face. Two not quite teens and not yet adults, sat on the front porch steps as they looked out at an empty world.

"She never listens teh me," she started, leaning forward to rest her elbow on her knee and her chin in her palm. "She's always tellin' meh wha' teh do. How teh act. She does nit get it. Aye need freedom. Aye need teh be on my own sometimes. Aye need teh be how Aye am with out anyone tellin' me Aye'm wrong."

"Yeah," Hiccup agreed as he leaned sideways against his porch post, looking out over the empty, rubble filled street. "I know what that's like."

Time spiraled on, the two sitting there in each other's silence, not bothering to feel uncomfortable or unsettled by it in the least. At some point, Toothless had given a small whine and had laid down, his head resting on his front paws as he waited for his master.

"Yer dah'd," Merida said finally in the quietest voice Hiccup had ever heard from her. A slight breeze swirled around them to stir her hair, no doubt blowing a few strands past her face. "How'd he die?"

Hiccup leaned his head against the post, letting his whole weight rest against it now. Yet another unexpected question. Maybe this fiery tempered Scotts girl with too much hair than she knew what to do with was a bit more complicated than he thought. Hiccup let out a sigh and stretched his left leg out on the step below him, a numb ache having started to creep up his leg. He really shouldn't have run out as fast as he had, especially since he hadn't completely healed yet.

"He caught the virus," he finally answered, his voice tired. "Just like everyone else."

He paused then, wondering if he should continue. Wondering if this was something he wanted to remember right now. His next words were hesitant.

"Only, he—he didn't want to go like everyone else….He asked me to kill him. So he wouldn't become some mindless, murdering 'sicko.' Only I couldn't. I…For whatever reason, I couldn't bring myself to do it. He begged. He pleaded and asked over and over, but I just couldn't pull the trigger. It wasn't long before he passed into the coma. I watched as he faded away, a picture of my mom still in his hands. And I thought that was it. I thought it was over and I wouldn't have to think about killing him. But I was wrong. He came back. My dad came back and attacked me in the kitchen when I was making dinner. Toothless came barking in like mad before I even realized what had been going on. The next thing I knew, I was fighting off my own dad with a kitchen knife, trying not to get bit. And I remember…his eyes. He had these bright blue, soulless dead eyes that I thought could look right through me. And that was when it really hit me: I had to kill my dad."

Hiccup paused there, having to swallow and take a second before continuing. Merida waited patently without sparing a glance back.

"So I used the knife," Hiccup said, trying his best not to choke on his own words. "I used the knife and I, I just…left him there. In the kitchen. I looked at his body like I couldn't believe what I'd done and then I just left him. I ran upstairs to pack a few bags for me and Toothless and when I came back downstairs, my dad—he-he was on fire. He'd fallen onto the stove after I—after I, you know, and I'd left the burner on. He'd caught fire and suddenly the whole kitchen was in flames, and then, the house. Toothless and I barely made it out before the entire house came down."

Hiccup left the story there as he tried to reign in his emotions. He heard as Toothless gave a whine and sat up on his haunches, looking up at him with large, worried eyes. He absent-mindedly reached down to give the mutt a reassuring pat on the head as he tried to blink back the stinging in his own eyes.

After a few moments, Merida broke the silence.

"Sounds like a viking funeral teh me."

Hiccup couldn't help but let out a small laugh at that, a smile breaching his face. His dad would've loved to hear that. To hear that he'd gone out in a blaze of glory.

"Yeah," he said. "Guess it does.

The redhead gave one last sigh then and hefted herself to her feet, brushing off her cut-offs and the plaid shirt tied around her waist.

"Come on," she said as she turned around and held a hand out to Hiccup to help him to his feet. "Let's get home."

* * *

Rapunzel's consciousness floated to the surface as she heard a sudden noise. She blinked a few times and then planted her hands on the bed to lift her upper body with her arms, her back arching as she let out a yawn and looked around.

They were on the second floor of the fire station, in the sleeping quarters. It large room dedicated to allowing firefighters a good night's rest with the beds all lined up in a row and their headboards against a wall.

As Rapunzel looked around, she saw that Jack was awake, sitting up in his bed next to hers and breathing heavily. Though their wasn't much light to see by, Rapunzel could see his face shining with sweat. Before she could say anything, Jack suddenly stood up. Rapunzel watched as he marched out of the room towards the stairs without giving any sign that he'd noticed her.

"He's alright, sheila. Don't worry about him."

Rapunzel turned to find Bunny in the bed on her other side, bright green eyes awake and glinting in the darkness.

"Boy's a pain in the ass, but it's nothing he can't handle."

"What's wrong with him?" Rapunzel asked, casting a concerned look at the door Jack had just disappeared through.

"It's just night terrors. We all get them, love. You will too… eventually."

Rapunzel glanced at Bunny as he rolled over to get back to sleep. She held back the urge to jump out of bed and follow Jack. If Bunny said he was fine, then he was fine. Reluctantly, Rapunzel snuggled back under her covers, only this time turned on her side so she could continue to stare at the door of the room. She lay there, waiting for Jack to come back so that she'd know he was alright.

—

He was high. Very high. He was at the top of some pillar. He was so high up, he could see a floor of clouds collected below him. When he tried to see the ground below, all he could make out was a hazy color, all the details washed away by distance.

"Jack!"

He spun around, a voice coming at him from nowhere and everywhere all at once. A gust of wind whirled around him, clawing at his hair and clothes, trying to pull him over the edge.

"Jack!"

Jack turned around again, looking desperately for the source of the voice calling out to him. His heart thudded in his throat as adrenaline pumped through his veins. He had to find that voice. He didn't know why. But it needed him. Whoever they were, he had to save them.

Another gust of wind billowed past him, forcing him to crouch down and grip at the edges of his platform to keep from being swept off it. He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth against the pull of the wind. The top of the pillar wasn't very big. It was maybe two feet wide, at most. He didn't have a whole lot of room for error.

"Jack, I'm scared."

Jack's eyes snapped open. He whipped his head around from side to side as he continued to hold onto his ledge. His eyes went wild, straining to see anything that might tell him where the voice was coming from. All he found was the sky stretching endlessly on in front of him.

"Where are you!" he screamed as tears streamed down his face.

He had to find them. He _had_ to. He had to help them. Save them. Jack could feel as panic seeped into him, his mind going mad. His breaths were fast. He couldn't think straight. He didn't know what to do. He had to find that voice. He had to save them. He had to.

The wind picked up speed, twirling around him in a hurricane, whipping his hair into his eyes and catching his overly large brown coat like a sail.

"Jack! Help me!"

Jacks squeezed his eyes tight as he tried to hang on to his ledge. The wind continued to pull at him, the tips of his fingers being the only thing to keep him from flying off the pillar.

"Jack! Save me!"

Jack felt like his chest was tearing in two. His head hurt and tears continued to stream down his face. He didn't know what to do. He didn't know what to do. He had to save that voice but he didn't know how. He felt so helpless. Panic sung in his veins as the wind continued to tear and grab at him. His fingernails gripped at the edge of the pillar.

"Jack!"

Jack's eyes snapped open and widened in horror as he felt his fingers slip off the edge of his platform. He felt as the wind picked him up and sent him flying off the pillar, leaving him to free fall as he reached towards the sky, still searching for the source of that voice.

_No_, he thought. _No, I couldn__'__t save them._

A scream ripped from his throat as he fell to his death.

_"__EMMA!__"_

—

Jack sat bolt upright as a cold sweat soaked through his clothes, his breaths ragged and uncontrolled. His heart was racing, the panic from the dream still evident in the tightness of his chest.

Unable to take it anymore, Jack threw off his covers and climbed out of bed. He stumbled through the dark towards the door and made his way downstairs. His mind was racing as he tried not to think about his dream. The panic it gave him. The fear. He had to stop it. Stop thinking about Emma and that image of her falling from that skyscraper over and over and over playing on repeat in his head like some kind of fucked up video. Jack squeezed his eyes shut and shook his head, trying the scatter the images flashing across his mind. He had to get ahold of himself. He had to forget about it. It had already happened. He'd failed to protect his sister and now she was dead. Nothing he could do now could change that. So he had to stop thinking about it. Had to forget about it. It hurt too much.

Jack was thankful they'd left the generator running, so he could have some light as he made his way towards the kitchen. In twenty minutes, he was sitting at the kitchen table, a cup if instant coffee cupped in his hands, the steam floating in front of his face. It was hot. It burned his palms, but Jack still held onto the coffee cup. The pain was good. It helped distract from his thoughts.

Jack let out a sigh and leaned over his mug, letting the steam float into his face. He couldn't go back to sleep now. Not with knowing that dream was waiting for him. It'd been nearly four months and the dreams still hadn't stopped. There would be periods where they would seem to have gone away. A reprieve from the nightmares and the terrors. But they always came back. Always. The dreams weren't always the same, either. Sometimes, he was back on those cross beams of a building with Emma, looking at her, waiting for her to jump. Waiting for her to fall, because she always fell. In every dream. It was either him or her. But every time, someone fell. And every time, Jack couldn't save her.

After that day on the skyscraper, Jack had been in a state of shock. He was alone. Completely and utterly alone. The only thing he'd cared about was gone, and now he was alone. He'd wandered around afterwards, with no real purpose or plan. What was the point, anyways? He had nothing to live for. Not any more.

His only goal had been to survive. He'd eat when he could and slept when it was possible. He'd found a good, solid, steal staff that he'd used to fight off the zombies (calling them sickies had only reminded him of Emma) and bash their skulls in. And he kept moving. He kept moving forward, trying to put as much distance between him and that construction cite, the image of blood splattered across the sidewalk still fresh in his mind.

That was how he'd ended up in Kentucky, of all places. Rapunzel had asked about that, hadn't she? About how he'd ended up there? It was because he hadn't been paying attention. After he'd lost Emma, his only goal was to keep moving forward, and he hadn't much cared where. And so he'd wandered his way a few hundred miles in the wrong direction.

That was when Flynn and Bunny had found him. They had snapped him out of his daze and told him where he was. They had dragged him along with them, told him their names, where they were going, how Flynn had found Bunny in the first place. Jack went along, partly because he really had nowhere better to go, mostly because he didn't think he could handle being alone anymore.

So, he'd changed his last name, giving them something out of a fairytale he used to read as a kid. He'd plastered a smile on his face and never mentioned Emma, never told them that he'd had a sister. He kept it swept under the rug, locked inside, forcing his playful personality to show through and pretending to be a happy to at least help numb the pain. He didn't want them to know. He didn't want to have anything that could make him remember. It was better that way.

Jack looked up as he heard the sound of the station door opening and closing. Before he'd had time to panic or prepare himself for a fight with the intruder, a large figure filled the entryway of the kitchen. They froze when they saw Jack seated at the table, a now cold cup of coffee in his hands.

"Jack?"

It was then that Jack realized that the intruder wasn't an intruder at all.

"Flynn?"

The tall brunette stepped forward into the light of the kitchen, the look of surprise still on his face. He came up to the side of the table across from Jack, swinging two duffle bags off his shoulder to land on the table with a thud as he did so.

"What're you doing up?" he asked, situating his duffle bags side-by side on the kitchen table.

"I could ask you the same question," Jack muttered, still surprised by the sudden apparition. "Where've you been?"

Jack could see as a small smile flitted to Flynn's face, barely noticeable as he looked down at the bags he was still fiddling with. He looked…proud.

"Just picking up supplies. Good haul, if I do say so myself."

Jack looked at the bag Flynn still had his hands on. He glanced up at the taller man, that self-satisfied smile still beaming on his face as he stood on the other side of the table. Something was off. What was Flynn doing going for a supply run on his own at five in the morning?

"Yeah?" he asked. "What kind of supplies?"

"Uh, you know, just some basics," Flynn said as he ran a hand through his hair and looked up, his gaze landing everywhere but Jack.

"Where'd you get them?"

"Around," Flynn said with a shrug as he stared at the ceiling.

Yup, something was definitely wrong. With one more concerned glance, Jack shot to his feet and grabbed one of the duffle bags. Flynn reacted just as fast, his hand seizing hold of the duffle, stopping it from sliding across the table to Jack.

"Flynn, what's in here?" Jack asked, his tone uncharacteristically dark.

"I already said: supplies."

"What _kind_ of supplies?"

"I told you. Just some—"

"If they're really 'just some basics,' then let me see them."

Flynn finally looked at Jack, his mouth opening and closing as Jack continued to stare at him with a cold look. After a moment longer of this Mexican standoff, Flynn let out a sigh and let go of the bag. Still glaring at Flynn, Jack yanked the bag towards him. He ripped open the zipper, looked down, and froze. The bag was stuffed full to bursting. And it was, by no means, a small bag at that. Jack stared at the contents.

Inside were more than a dozen army ration packs, containing enough protein and nutrients to feed— well, an army. After the outbreak, ration packs were hard to come by, especially with everyone realizing how valuable they could be. The rules were to get them if you could and only use them when you needed. Seeing so many at once was a hardly imaginable sight. But that wasn't what surprised Jack. Oh, no. What had surprised him was the fourteen or so rifles and semi-automatics stuffed into the bag among the meal packs. All military grade.

"Flynn," Jack asked, his tone cautious as he continued to look at the contents of the duffle, not sure that he wanted to know the answer of what he was about to ask. "Where did you get all of this?"

* * *

It was storming. Raging, more like. Rain pounded at the house, creating a white-noised din. The sky was dark, nearly pitch black as clouds blocked out all outside light, leaving only a few scattered candles to light the way inside, their jumping flames casting a eerie atmosphere. The wind whistled and howled outside, rattling the windows and doors as it ripped away side panelling and roofing from the house. Bright flashes of lightning illuminated the sky outside, soon followed by rolling rumbles loud enough to rattle Hiccup's teeth.

The whole house shook as five of the DunBrochs sat huddled around the lit fireplace once more. A beautiful song rang throughout the house. Above the sound of the storm and the wind and the rain. Above the feeling of the slight fear and nervousness one might normally find in the middle of a raging tempest. Above it all was an ancient language that rang out with such a clarity, it seemed to make everything else melt away.

_A naoidhean bhig, cluinn mo ghuth_

_Mise ri d' thaobh, O mhaighdean bh__à__n_

A mother sat in front of the fireplace, a gentle and willowy figure bent over the three, small children collected in her lap, all curled up in her protection as the storm raged on outside. A father sat behind her, large and powerful, a symbol of protection with his arm around his noble maiden fair. Her song continued to sing through the air, the clear and beautiful notes of it burrowing beep to the soul as it washed away the torment that was the outside world.

_Ar r__ì__bhinn __ò__g, f__à__s a's faic_

_Do th__ì__r, d__ì__leas f__é__in_

"She used teh sing tha' teh me when Aye was wee."

Hiccup turned around to find that Merida had materialized behind him, the firelight flashing in her eyes as she looked out at her family. Hiccup turned back around, leaning against the wall of the hallway once more as he watched the family and listened to the melody that seemed to carry the very highlands with it.

"It's beautiful," he said quietly.

"Ay," came the equally quiet response.

_A ghrian a's a ghealach, sti__ù__ir sinn_

_Gu uair ar cli__ù __'s ar gl__ò__ir_

"Your mother has a wonderful voice," Hiccup said, breaking the silence between the two adolescents as they continued to watch the family huddled around the fire. He glanced at the redhead.

"I bet you do, too."

Merida scoffed.

"As if Aye'm a Disney princess. Aye _don't_ sing. Besides," she said as she turned away from the fire and its warmth. "It's not mai song teh sing."

Hiccup watched as she walked back down the hallway and into the darkness on her own, the storm raging ever harder outside.

_ Naoidhean bhig, ar r__ì__bhinn __ò__g_

_ Maighdean uasal bh__à__n_

* * *

"Hey, Blondie."

"Hmmmm?" Rapunzel asked, feeling consciousness at the edges of her sleep.

"Is she up yet?"

"No, I'm trying. Hey."

Rapunzel felt a hand on her shoulder as voices filtered through her sleep into her head.

"Come on, Blondie, wake up."

Rapunzel felt as the hand shook her gently. She rolled over, her dreams scattering as she tried to pull herself out of her sleepy stupor. She blinked a few times, looking up as she waited for the fog of having just woken up to clear. She must've fallen asleep while waiting for Jack to come back. A face came into focus in front of her, bright hazel eyes looking earnestly at her, concern etched into a slightly scruffy face.

"Hmmm. Flynn?"

"Hey, she awake yet?"

A head of ruffled, chocolate brown hair suddenly came into focus behind Flynn. It was Jack, a worried look stretching his features, his normal smile nowhere in sight.

Rapuzel blinked a few times as she looked at them and was suddenly wide-awake. There was something off. Something very, very wrong. It was in Jack and Flynn's voices, in the way they looked at her and the way they fidgeted as if they were nervous about something. She glanced over to find that Bunny wasn't in the bed next to hers anymore. She suddenly heard the roar of an engine coming to life downstairs.

"Come on, Blondie," Flynn ordered, grabbing her hand and hauling her to her feet. "We have to get going."

Flynn pulled her out of the room and down the stairs by her hand, Jack quick to follow behind them. Rapunzel could feel her heart pounding a mile a minute, even though she'd only just woken. What was going on? Why was everyone so worried? She had no clue what was happening, but the way the boys were acting was enough to send her into a panic.

"Going?" she asked as they burst out of the front doors of the station to find the truck pulled out of the garage and sitting out front, its engine humming. "Going where?"

"Anywhere but here!" Jack called as Flynn hauled her into the already running truck, jumping in after her as Jack climbed into the front seat, Bunny riding in the driver's side. Before the doors had even closed all the way, Bunny floored it, making the engine scream as they pealed out of the asphalt in front of the station. Rapunzel turned to look out the back window as the fire station shrank away in the distance, everything she'd brought with her left behind in her bag. She hadn't even had a chance to grab her shoes. She glanced at Jack in the front seat. He was barefoot, too. Whatever was going on, none of them had had any chance to prepare for it.

"Guys, what's going on? What's happening?" Rapunzel asked, leaning forward with both hands on either of the two front seats as she tried to balance herself in the midst of Bunny's erratic driving. He was swerving and bumping over debris and potholes as if he were aiming for them as he floored the accelerator. Rapunzel was finding it difficult to keep on her feet.

"Well," Jack started, bracing himself on the passenger door as Bunny took a sharp turn to avoid hitting a mini van parked out on the road. "It seems Flynn here thought it would be a fantastic idea to steal supplies from a gang of murderous thieves!"

There was a loud _bump!_ and _clunk! _as all four of them lifted into the air, the car momentarily air born as they ran over a stray log that had been left in the road. The truck landed heavily, toppling Rapunzel over as Flynn fell into the passenger seat in front of him. Jack nearly went through the front windshield.

"_What?_" Rapunzel asked as she clambered back to her feet in the back of the truck.

"And now, apparently, they're out to get their stuff back at any cost. _Including_," Jack spun around in his seat to glare at Flynn in the seat behind him, "killing each and every one of us."

"Hey," Flynn started in, leaning forward from the back. "I was getting the supplies I thought we needed!"

"By jacking them from a _gang_!" Jack yelled back. "What do we even need that many guns for!?"

"For protection!"

"Anything loud enough to attract the zeds like that is useless!"

"Oi, oi, oi!"

Bunny's arm suddenly shot out, connecting with Jack's cheek first, then swinging back to knock Flynn in the face, forcing him to sink back into the back seat, holding his nose with a groan.

"Pull ya heads in, ya bloody show ponies!" Bunny hollered as he gripped the steering wheel and spun it to avoid running them off the road. "I can't bloody drive with ya yellin' like that! What matters is that we get as far away from those bushrangers as possible, so shut you're holes!"

There was a sudden roar, and Rapunzel spun back around to find another car materialize around the corner, its engine a din of noise as it raced towards them, headlights flashing like a demon come to swallow them whole.

* * *

Hiccup jolted awake, consciousness flooding his senses before he even opened his eyes. He sat up in bed, blinking through the darkness as he felt Toothless stir awake besides him, a whine or two reaching his ears. Hiccup's hand automatically went to his friend's head, scratching gently between the ears as he sat stock still, senses on alert. Something had woken him up. Whatever it was, it had woken him before it had woken Toothless, so he was doubtful that whatever it was was dangerous. But still, there had been _something_. Something out of the ordinary that had ripped Hiccup out of his sleep.

So, very carefully, the brunette swung his legs over the side of the mattress and grabbed his prosthetic that was propped up against the wall next to his bed. Working as quietly as he could, Hiccup strapped on his leg and got to his feet. It'd been just over a week and a half since the major fall out between Merida and her mother. Since then, not only had Hiccup's wounds all but disappeared, but he and the Scotts girl had been on better terms. Not great, but they could at least be in the same room together without Hiccup feeling death glares boring into the back of his skull. Unfortunately, the same could not be said for the mother/daughter duo. The fights and arguments continued with no sign of letting up anytime soon. Hiccup couldn't help but wonder if they had any chance what-so-ever of making amends and getting along.

Creeping as quietly as possible, the adolescent made his way to his door as he heard the sound of Toothless slinking out of bed to follow him, paws padding softly on carpet. Hiccup slowly pushed open his door, the muffled sounds of scuffling and cursing reaching his ears as he cast his eyes about, looking for the source of the noises. It was only when he'd opened the door a bit wider and stuck his head out a bit further that he could see what was happening.

It was Merida. She was awake. But that was no surprise, she was usually on the night watch at around this time. What was surprising was that she was in the house, on the living room couch, mussing around with the contents of a backpack before swinging it onto her shoulders, followed quickly by the strap of a quiver and the string of her bow. In the next two seconds, she was on her feet and out the door, closing it quietly behind her without even noticing Hiccup.

Hiccup stood there in a daze. He hadn't really just seen that, had he? It was one thing to storm out of the house in a rage, but another thing completely to pack up and leave your family in the middle of the night. He couldn't believe that Merida, of all people, would just abandon her kin like that. Or maybe she didn't? Maybe Hiccup was missing something completely. Maybe this whole situation had nothing to do with abandonment at all. But if that were the case, what had just happened? Why had Merida left? Where was she going?

Hiccup was pulled from his musings as he heard a whine from around his knee area as Toothless tried to nose his snout further between the small gap between Hiccup's legs and the door jam. Hiccup looked down and let a small smile flit to his face.

"Yeah, Bud, alright, alright," he whispered, pushing the mutt away from the door with his foot.

As his faithful companion waited rather impatiently, Hiccup quickly got dressed and shoved a few essentials into a bag that he then swung onto his shoulders. Gripping a sword lent to him by Fergus tight in one hand and a flashlight in another, Hiccup then quietly led Toothless out of the house and through the front door, following the feisty redhead into the night.

* * *

**A/N: Ayyyyyyyy. It's a long one. Also, mostly character developement.**


End file.
